HHHMB^^^MH^HI^^^^Hi 



The Beauty of Every Day 



By 
J. R. Miller. 




Glass T )V ' : 

Book 

Copyright N°_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSHV 



Wot Peautp of Cberp 2iaj> 



DR. J. E. MILLEE'S BOOKS 


A Heart Garden 


Joy of Service 


Beauty of Every Day 


Lesson of Love 


Bethlehem to Olivet 


Making the Most of Life 


Building of Character 


Ministry of Comfort 


Come ye Apart 


Morning Thoughts 


Dr. Miller's Year Book 


Personal Friendships of 


Evening Thoughts 


Jesus 


Every Day of Life 


Silent Times 


Finding the Way 


Story of a Busy Life 


For the Best Things 


Strength and Beauty 


Gate Beautiful 


Things to Live for 


Glimpses through Life's 


Upper Currents 


Windows 


When the Song Begins 


Go Forward 


Wider Life 


Golden Gate of Prayer 


Young People's Problems 


Hidden Life 




BOOKLETS 


Beauty of Kindness 


Marriage Altar 


Blessing of Cheerfulness 


Mary of Bethany 


By the Still Waters 


Master's Friendships 


Christmas Making 


Secret of Gladness 


Cure for Care 


Secrets of Happy Home 


Face of the Master 


Life 


Gentle Heart 


Summer Gathering 


Girls ; Faults and Ideals 


To-day and To-morrow 


Glimpses of the Heavenly 


Transfigured Life 


Life 


Turning Northward 


How? When? Where? 


Unto the Hills 


In Perfect Peace 


Young Men ; Faults and 


Inner Life 


Ideals 


Loving my Neighbor 




THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY 



peautp of €berj> ©ap 

j/r/miller 

AUTHOR OF " SILENT TIMES," " MAKING THE MOST 
OF LIFE," "UPPER CURRENTS," ETC. 



" This could but have happened once, — 
And we missed it, lost it forever." 

Bbowning 



lUeto iorfe 

THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. 
PUBLISHERS 



\ 



n* 



Copyright, 1910, by Thomas Y. Crowell fy Co. 



Published September, 1910. 



©CI.A273076 






fc S * 

r. 1 HESE simple chapters may have their mes- 
sages for new friends and old, — those who for 
many years have been reading the authors books 
and those who may pick up this volume by chance. 
The lessons are not new^ yet they may touch lives 
that need them ; and if they do not take away bur- 
dens, they may make hearts braver and stronger 

to bear them. 

J. R. M. 

Philadelphia, U. S, A. 



TITLES OF CHAFfERS 



I. While we May Page 1 

II. The Glory of the Common Life 15 

III. Seeds of Light 31 

IV. He Calls us Friends 47 
V. Not Counting God 61 

VI. Perfection in Loving 77 

VII. Shut thy Door 89 

VIII. What to do with Doubts 105 

IX. Things that Hurt Life 119 

X. Getting Away from our Past 135 

XI. Thomas's Mistake 149 

XII. Friends and Friendship 161 

XIII. The Yoke and the School 175 

XIV. The Weak Brother 191 
XV. The Lure of the Ministry 207 

XVI. Narrow Lives 221 

XVII. The True Enlarging of Life 235 

XVIII. Through the Year with God 249 

XIX. The Remembers 263 

XX. Caring for the Broken Things 279 



mtyit mt jfta? 



" There is a nest of thrushes in the glen; 

When we come back we '11 see the glad young things ," 
He said. We came not by that way again; 

And time and thrushes fare on eager wings! 

"Yon rose" she smiled. "But no; when we return, 
I '11 "pluck it then." 'T was on a summer day. 

The ashes of the rose in autumn's urn 

Lie hidden well. We came not back that way. 

Thou traveller to the unknown ocean's brink, 
Through life's fair fields, say not, " Another day 

This joy I '11 prove; " for never, as I think, 
Never shall we come this selfsame way. 



m^tle Wit ffiav 




ESUS defended Mary when 
the disciples criticised her 
anointing of him. They 
said the ointment should 
have be^n sold and the money 
given to the poor, instead of being used for 
a mere personal service. But Jesus said to 
them, " Ye have the poor always with you, 
and whensoever ye will ye can do them good ; 
but me ye have not always." Whatever 
they did for him, they must do then. In a 
little while he would not be with them any 
more. There would never be a day when 
they could not minister to the poor, but he 
would not sit again at Mary's table. If she 
had not brought her alabaster cruse that 
evening and broken it, she never would have 
done it. 

If you know that this is the last day you 
will have a certain rare friend, that to-night 

[3] 



€$e QBeaut? of dEtoet? ?®ay 

he will vanish from your companionship, and 
you will never see him again, you will sur- 
round him with the warmest devotion and 
lavish upon him your heart's holiest affec- 
tion while you may. 

This is a lesson we should learn well. Op- 
portunities come to-day and pass, and will 
never come to us again. Other opportunities 
will come to-morrow, but these will never re- 
turn. The human needs that make their 
appeal to you now will be beyond the reach of 
your hand by another day. Whatever kind- 
ness you would do, you must do now, for you 
may not pass this way again. If we realized 
this truth as we should, it would make the 
common events of our life mean far more than 
they do. We are always meeting experiences 
which are full of rich possible outcome. God 
is in all our days and nights. Opportunities 
come to us with the hour, with the moment, 
and each one says to us, " Me ye have not 
always." If we do not take them as they 
come, we cannot take them at all. 

There are two kinds of sins, as the old 

[4] 



Wfyilt Wit jttai? 



moralists put it — sins of omission and sins 
of commission — sins of doing, as when we 
do evil things, and sins of not doing, as when 
we neglect to do the things we ought to have 
done. One comes to you in distress, needing 
cheer, some kindly help., or deliverance from 
some danger, and you let the trouble go un- 
relieved, the sorrow uncomforted, the want 
unsupplied. The opportunity has passed 
and you have missed it. There is a blank in 
your life ; you have left a duty undone. 

One virtuous and pure in heart did pray: 
" Since none I wronged in deed or word to-day, 
From whom should I crave pardon? 
Master, say." 

A voice replied: 
" From the sad child whose joy thou hast not 

planned ; 
The goaded beast whose friend thou didst not stand; 
The rose that died for water from thy hand." 

Everyone we meet any day comes to us 
either to receive some gift or blessing from 
us, or to bring some gift or blessing to us. 
We do not think of this, usually, in our 

m 



C&e I3eautv of €Uvy ^a? 

crowded days, in the confusion of meetings 
and partings. We do not suppose there is 
any meaning in what we call the incidental 
contacts of life, as when we ride upon the 
car beside another, for a few minutes, or 
meet another at a friend's house and talk a 
little while together, or when we sit beside 
another in the same office day after day. 
We are not in the habit of attaching any 
importance to these contacts with others. 
We do not suppose that God ordered this 
meeting or that, that he sent this person to 
us because the person needs us, and that we 
are to do something for him, or else we need 
something, some influence, some inspiration, 
some cheer, from him. But the fact is that 
God is in all our life and is always ordering 
its smallest events. 

When the older people think of it, they 
will see that this is true. When they look 
back over their years, they will find that the 
strange network of circumstances and experi- 
ences that has marked their days has not 
been woven by chance, is no confused tangle 

[6] 



mtyiz mt i^at 



of threads, crossing and recrossing, without 
plan or direction, but rather that it makes 
a beautiful web, with not one thread out of 
place. The whole is the filling out of a pat- 
tern designed by the great Master of life. 
Most of the friendships of our lives are made 
in this way — you and your friend meeting 
first by chance, as we would say. You did 
not choose each other. Emerson spoke for 
all when he said, " My friends have come to 
me unsought; the great God gave them to 
me." All life is thus full of God. 

Jesus taught the importance of the pres- 
ent opportunity in the Garden of Gethsem- 
ane. He asked three of his disciples to 
keep watch with him while he went deeper 
into the shadows and knelt in prayer. A 
great anguish was upon him and he needed 
and craved human sympathy. After his first 
agony of supplication he came back to his 
friends, hoping to get a little strength from 
their love, but found them asleep. In his 
bitter disappointment he returned to his place 
of prayer. A second time he came back, and 

[7] 



C^e Beaut? of (fcbtvy ?^a? 

again they were asleep. The third time he 
said to them, " Sleep on now, and take your 
rest." There was no need to wake and 
watch any longer. The hour had come, the 
traitor was approaching, the torches were 
flashing through the trees. There is a 
strange pathos in the Master's final words. 
The disciples had had their opportunity for 
helping him, but had not improved it. They 
had slept when his heart was crying out for 
their waking. Now the hour was past when 
waking would avail, and they might as well 
sleep on. 

We do not dream of the criticalness of life, 
of the mighty momentousness there is in the 
hours through which we pass, what blessing 
and good come to us when we watch and are 
faithful, what loss and sorrow come when we 
sleep and are faithless. " Me ye have not 
always " is the voice of every opportunity 
to receive good in some form. We miss God's 
gift because we shut our hearts upon it, and 
only when it is too late, when the gifts have 
vanished, are we ready to accept them. Or 

[8] 



WityXz Wit jHai? 



it may be an opportunity to do something 
for another. We dally, and the opportunity 
passes. The person perishes, perhaps, be- 
cause we were not awake. 

Opportunities differ in their importance. 
" Ye have the poor always with you, and 
whensoever ye will ye can do them good : but 
me ye have not always." Jesus was defend- 
ing Mary's act of love to him. If Mary had 
not brought her precious ointment that night, 
she never could have brought it. She had 
wrought a good work on him. We never can 
know what great good she wrought on him, 
how much comfort and strength she gave to 
him. He was carrying then the heaviest load 
any heart ever carried. We all remember 
hours of great need in our own lives, hours 
of anxiety, of sorrow, of pain, when a word 
spoken to us, or a flower sent to our room, 
or a card coming through the mail, or some 
little human touch, came to us as a very mes- 
senger of God. We never can tell how Mary's 
love helped Jesus that night. The disciples 
said the ointment was wasted, did no one any 

[9] 



€^e iszmty of €toeri? ^a? 

good. Ah ! they did not know what that 
expression of love meant to the Master, how 
it cheered him, how it heartened him for 
going on to his cross. If they had known, 
they never would have said that the ointment 
would have done more good if it had been 
applied to relieving the poor. 

There would have been times when the 
poor should have had the benefit of Mary's 
gift. If the cruse of oil had been broken to 
honor some unworthy man, it would have 
been wasted. But Jesus was the Son of God. 
This particular hour was one when he needed 
love, when he craved sympathy, when he 
longed to be strengthened. In all time there 
never was an hour when a simple gift of love 
could have meant so much as Mary's meant 
that night in Simon's house. " Me ye have 
not always." The blessing which the three 
hundred shillings would have given to the 
poor never could have been compared for a 
moment with the blessing which the ointment, 
as an expression of love, was to Jesus. 

Life is full of similar contrasts in the value 
[10] 



mtyit taut pay 



of opportunities. There are commonplace 
opportunities, and there are opportunities 
which are radiant and splendid. There are 
days and days when the best use one can 
make of money is to give it to those who need 
it, or to some institution. Then there comes 
a day, an hour, when some rare and sacred 
need arises, which eclipses in importance as 
day excels night in its brightness, all common 
needs, — a need which must be met instantly 
and heroically and at once. A few times in 
every good man's life there comes a moment 
of supreme importance, when every other 
appeal or call for help must be unheeded for 
one which must be answered at once. There 
are many things which must be done instantly, 
or they cannot be done at all. An artist was 
watching a pupil sketch a sunset scene. He 
noticed that the young man was lingering on 
his sketching of a barn in the foreground, 
while the sun was hastening to its setting. 
The artist said to his pupil, " Young man, 
if you lose more time sketching the shingles 
on the barn roof, you will not catch the sun- 



C^e TBeaut? of Cfcetv ?£>at 

set at all." This is just what many people 
do. They give all their time to commonplace 
things, to fences and barn roofs and sheds, 
and miss the glorious sunsets. They give to 
the poor and help them, but have no thought 
for Christ. They toil for honor, money, and 
fame, and never see God nor get acquainted 
with him. There are friendships which never 
reach their possible richness and depths of 
beauty, playing only along the shore, while 
the great ocean of love lies beyond unex- 
plored. They miss the really splendid things 
in life, while they live for the poor and sordid 
things. 

We do not begin to realize how many of 
us pay heed only to second-rate things, while 
we miss altogether the great things of life. 
We spend hours upon newspapers, never 
reading a book that is worth while. All the 
best opportunities of life are transient. 
They are with us to-day, but to-morrow they 
are gone. " Me ye have not always." There 
is a time for forming friendships, but it does 
not stay always. Miss it, and to-morrow you 

[12] 



mtyu mt jHa? 



cannot find it. There is a time for making a 
beautiful home life, but soon the time is gone 
if it is not improved. Impatience, fretful- 
ness, selfishness, irritability, nagging — you 
know how the beauty is marred, the brightness 
dimmed, the sweetness embittered by these. 
When two young people marry and begin to 
make a home, they have almost infinite pos- 
sibilities before them. But the vision must 
be seized at once, and not a moment must be 
lost. " Me ye have not always," the oppor- 
tunity says to the home-builders. Some years 
after they find that they have failed, that 
the vision has faded, and that they cannot 
get it back again. 

To every young person there comes in the 
bright days the opportunity of living a beau- 
tiful life, but it comes only once and it stays 
only for a little while. The vision will not 
wait. " Me ye have not always," it says. 
There are some things we can do any time, 
but this is not true of following Christ. We 
think it is — that we can accept him and take 
the blessings of his love when we will, but it is 

[13] 



W$z 'Beaut? of cEber? ?®ay 

not true. Delay dulls and hardens our 
hearts. Delay uses up the moments of his 
waiting and eats up our opportunity. At 
our convenience we say, " I will take him 
now " ; we turn and he is gone. 

All the best things are transient. George 
Klingle has written a little poem, entitled, 
"While We May." The words startle us. 
" While we may " suggests that there will 
come a time when we may not. 

" They are such fond, frail lips 

That speak to us. Pray, if love strips 

Them of discretion many times, 
Or if they speak too slow or quick, such crime 

We may pass by, for we may see 
Days not far off when those small words may be 
Held not as slow or quick, or out of place, but dear 

Because the lips are no more here." 

As we gather about our home table let us 
remember we may not all be there again, and 
let us make the meal one of sweetness and joy. 
Let us be patient with one another, kind and 
thoughtful, gentle, while we may. Soon we 
shall not have each other. 

[14] 



C^e dBao?? of t^e Common life 



He had time to see the beauty 

That the Lord spread all round; 
He had time to hear the music 

In the shells the children found; 
He had time to keep repeating 

As he bravely worked aivay: 
"It is splendid to be living 

In the splendid world to-day ! " 
But the crowds — the crowds that hurry 

After golden prizes — said 
That he never had succeeded. 



..." He was a failure," they compassionately 
sighed. 
For the man had little money in his pockets when he 
died. 



II 



C^e dftot^ of ttje Common life 



T was only a scrubby bush 
that Moses saw in the desert, 
and yet it gleamed with 
splendor, as if burning. No 
wonder the old shepherd 
turned aside to look at the strange sight. He 
wanted to solve the mystery. But a voice 
halted him. God was in the bush. Mrs. 
Browning, referring to this singular incident 
says: 




" Earth 's crammed with heaven, 
And every common bush afire with God: 
But only he who sees takes off his shoes: 
The rest sit round and pluck blackberries. 5 



The poet's thought is that the glory of God 
is in everything, in every tree, in every flower, 
in every lowly bush, and that almost nobody 
sees the glory. Most people see only the 

[17] 



C^e OBeaut? of cBber? ?W 

burning bush or the plant. Only now and 
then one sees the flame, the splendor of God, 
and takes off his shoes. 

To many people life is all a dreary com- 
monplace. Some see nothing beautiful in 
nature. They will walk through the loveli- 
est gardens and see nothing to admire. They 
will move among people and never observe in 
them any glimpses of immortality, any re- 
vealings of the divine nature. They will go 
through all the years and never see God in 
anything. It would give us a radiant world 
in nature if our eyes were opened to see the 
splendor that is in every tree, plant, and 
flower. 

An artist was painting a picture which he 
hoped might be honored at the Academy. It 
was of a woman, struggling up a street, on 
a wild, stormy night, carrying her baby in her 
arms. Doors were shut in her face. No- 
where was there warmth, sympathy or love 
for her. The artist called the picture 
" Homeless. 55 As he was painting it, im- 
agination filled his soul with divine pity. 

[18] 



C^e dMor? of t^e Common Life 

" Why do I not go to lost people themselves, 
to try to save them, instead of merely paint- 
ing pictures of them ? " he began to ask. The 
common bush burned with fire. Under the 
impulse of the new feeling he gave himself 
to Christ and to the Christian ministry. He 
went to Africa as a missionary, devoting his 
life to the saving of the lowest lost. If we 
had eyes touched by divine anointing, we 
should see in every outcast, in every most 
depraved life, the gleaming of every possible 
glory. 

Many of the best people in the world are 
lowly and obscure. They have no shining 
qualities, no brilliant gifts. Yet if we could 
see them as they really are, we would find the 
thorn bush burning with fire. They are full 
of God. Christ lives in them. There is a 
story of a Christian Italian who works with 
pick and shovel, walking two miles every 
morning to his task. He lives on the plainest 
food. Yet he is the happiest man in all his 
neighborhood. He has a secret which keeps 
him happy in all his toil and pinching. 

[19] 



C^e CBeautt of Cfcer? &&V 

Away in Italy he has a wife and two child- 
ren, and he is working and saving to bring 
them to America, where he is building a 
home for them. His lowly thorn bush of 
hardness and poverty is aflame with the fire 
of love. 

God is found usually in most unlikely 
places. When the shepherds went to seek 
for the Holy Child, they did not go to fine 
mansions, to the homes of the great or rich, 
to earthly palaces — they found the Babe in 
a stable, sleeping in a manger. Lowell's 
" Vision of Sir Launfal " is a story for all 
days and all places. As the knight rode out 
from his castle gate at the beginning of his 
quest for the holy grail, he tossed a coin to 
the leper who sat by the wayside begging. 
Through all lands he rode in a vain search 
for the sacred cup. At length, old, broken, 
and disappointed, but chastened, he re- 
turned home. There sat the leper as before, 
by the castle gate. The knight has learned 
love's lesson. He shares his last crust with 
the leper. He breaks the ice on the stream 

[20] 



C^e <B\oty of ti&e Common tilt 

near by, brings water in his wooden bowl, 
and gives the beggar to drink. Then the 
leper is revealed as the Christ and the bowl 
as the holy Cup. 

Ofttimes it is in lowliest ways that God 
is found, after men have sought long for 
him in vain, in ways of splendor. A dis- 
ciple asked the Master to show him the 
Father. He thought the revealing would 
come in some heavenly splendor. Jesus said 
that he had been showing the Father in all 
the years he had been with the disciples. He 
referred to his everyday life of love and 
kindness. You say you never have seen God, 
and that you wish you could see him. You 
could believe in him more easily if you could 
see him sometimes. That is what the dis- 
ciples thought and said. " Show us the 
Father, and it sufficeth us," was their plead- 
ing. Yet they really had been seeing the 
Father all the three years. 

So it is that Christ comes to us contin- 
ually in plain garb, in lowly ways, without 
any apparent brightness. We decline tasks 

[21]. 



C^e TStauty of &Uty &ay 

and duties that are assigned to us, thinking 
they are not worthy of our fine hands, not 
knowing that they are holy ministries which 
angels would eagerly perform. Not one of 
the disciples that last night would take the 
basin and the towel and wash the feet of the 
others and of the Master. Washing feet 
was the lowliest of all tasks — the meanest 
slave in the household did it. But while 
these proud men scoffed and shrank from 
the service, Jesus himself did it. Then they 
saw that washing the feet of others in love 
is divine in its splendor. The thorn bush 
burned with fire. 

Some of the happiest people in the world 
are doing the plainest tasks, are living in 
the plainest way, have the fewest luxuries, 
scarcely ever have an hour for rest or play. 
They are happy because they are contented. 
They love God. They follow Christ. They 
have learned to love their work and do it 
with delight, with eagerness, with enthu- 
siasm. A pastor tells of calling at a little 
home in one of the smallest houses in his 

[22] 



C^e (Mot? of t^e Common life 

great parish. There is a widow who goes out 
to work all day, and a girl of twenty who 
also works. There is a boy of ten or twelve 
who is at school. It would not have been 
surprising if a tone of discontent had been 
found in the little home, or if there had 
been complaints about their hard condition. 
But the pastor heard no word that was not 
glad. The three people in the little house had 
learned to see brightness in their humble cir- 
cumstances. All the dreariness was touched 
with a heavenly gleam. The rough thorn 
bush burned with fire. 

The angels find much of earth's truest 
happiness in most unlikely places. Many of 
the sweetest Christians in the world are those 
who have least of earthly gladness. Their 
joy is the joy of the Lord, a joy which is 
transmuted sorrow. Many of the songs 
which are fullest of praise are sung in 
chambers of pain. St. Paul had learned to 
rejoice in tribulation. Many of the most ra- 
diant experiences of Christian life are born 
of pain. Jesus gave a beatitude for sorrow: 



i 



C^e I3eauti? of €Uty 3®ay 

" Blessed are they that mourn : for they 
shall be comforted." 

The North American Indians have a 
strange and beautiful fancy. They say that 
as the flowers fade, their beauty is not lost, 
but is gathered up into the rainbow, and 
thus the flowers live again in even richer 
colors than before. So the blessings that 
are taken out of our hands on earth are only 
gathered into heavenly blessedness, where 
they shall be ours forever. The rough thorn 
bush of sorrow is made by faith to appear 
in unfading glory, to glow in the radiance of 
God's eternal love. 

There are certain lives which we are accus- 
tomed to look upon and think of with pity. 
Their condition is always one of suffering. 
One person is blind and helpless ; another is 
crippled so as never to be able to leave her 
room; another is paralyzed and cannot use 
her hands or feet; another is a hopeless in- 
valid. We pity these people, and think their 
case is forlorn. Yes, but nowhere do you 
find such trust, such patience, such shining 

[24] 



C^e d5loti? of t^e Common JLtfe 

as in their lives. The thorn bushes bum 
with fire and are not consumed. 

Many people never have learned to see 
God in their everyday life. It seems to them 
their life is not worthy of them, that its 
splendor is lost in their commonplace tasks. 
In a little book published a few years since 
there was a story of a young minister vis- 
iting among his people. One day he called 
on an old shoemaker. He began to talk to 
the old man, and inadvertently spoke of his 
occupation as humble. The shoemaker was 
pained by the minister's word. 

" Do not call my occupation lowly ; it is 
no more lowly than yours. When I stand 
before God in judgment, he will ask about 
my work, and will ask what kind of shoes I 
made down here, and then he will want me 
to show him a specimen. He will ask you 
what kind of sermons you preached to your 
people, and will have you show him one. 
And if my shoes are better than your ser- 
mons, then I shall have fuller approval than 
you will have." 

[25] 



C^e 'hzauty of €toer? 3^a? 

The old man was not offended, he was only 
impressed with the honor of his own calling, 
as God saw it. He was right, too. No oc- 
cupation is in itself lowly — the commonest 
kind of work is radiant if it is done for God. 
We shall each be judged indeed by the way 
we have done the work of our profession, 
our trade, or our calling. What we do for 
Christ is glorious, however lowly it is in 
itself. 

There is an impression that the calling of 
a minister is more sacred than that of the 
carpenter, the shoemaker, or the merchant. 
But the old man was right when he said that 
his calling was as honorable as his pastor's. 
They do not have an ordination service for 
the painter or the grocer; but why should 
they not have? There really is a splendor, 
a radiancy, in each one's peculiar occupa- 
tion, however plain it may seem. St. Paul 
said to the Corinthians, " Let each man, 
wherein he was called, therein abide with 
God." The slave was to continue a slave, 
with God. The tradesman was to continue in 

[26] 



C^e <£>loti? of t^e Common Life 

his trade, with God. We should not feel hu- 
miliated by our earthly condition — we should 
glorify it. The angels, as they go about, do 
not recognize rank in people's occupations, 
— some graded low, some high. We are 
ranked by the degree of diligence or faithful- 
ness that we put into our tasks. The bright, 
cheery, good-hearted bootblack, who " shines 
'em up," is far above the useless, way-up 
millionaire who never thinks of God or man. 
You can live a noble, divine life anywhere 
with God. Your humblest thorn bush burns 
with fire. 

One whose life seems lowly writes : " Some 
of my friends pity me for having to work in 
a factory, but I feel honored that God should 
call me to work at something like my Mas- 
ter's earthly calling, and I do not feel that 
polishing and packing watch crystals is my 
real mission in this world any more than 
carpentering was His." The thorn bush 
burns with fire. 

We go to far-off lands to see the splendors 
there. Italy is glorious. Switzerland is 

[27] 



€^e QBeaut? of €Uvy l®ay 

glorious. But there is glory also in every 
common blade of grass, in every tiny flower, 
in every bud, in every leaf, in every butter- 
fly. You read biographies of great men and 
are charmed by what they did, by the noble 
qualities you find in their character. That 
is well. But just where you are there are 
glories too. In your own life there are di- 
vine possibilities. You have not yet begun 
to find them all or realize them. 

Perhaps you have been thinking rather 
discouragingly about yourself. You feel that 
you have hardly a fair share of comfort, of 
opportunities, of privileges. You have been 
almost fretting because you are not getting 
on or getting up as fast as you want to. 
You have been discontented, depressed. Ask 
God to open your eyes and you will see your 
thorn bush burning with fire. Your every- 
day life is full of splendor. There is not a 
single hour in your commonest day that is 
uneventful. You are thinking that there are 
no miracles any more. But there really are as 
many miracles any week as there were in the 

[28] 



C^e c0iort of ttye Common life 

life of any Bible saint. Or, you have been 
thinking of your troubles, that you have 
more than your share of them. Tourists 
come back from their travels and tell us about 
the lace weavers. Their work seems to the 
observer a great tangle, a strange puzzle. 
But out of it all there comes marvellous 
beauty. Life seems a tangle, a puzzle, to us, 
as we look at its events, its circumstances, its 
sorrows and joys. But in the end we shall 
see that not one thread was ever thrown into 
the wrong place in the web. God is in all 
our life. 

" I think if thou couldst see. 
With thy dim mortal sight, 
How meanings dark to thee 
Are shadows hiding light, 
Truth's efforts crossed and vexed, 
Life's purposes all perplexed, — 
If thou couldst see them right, 
I think that they would seem all clear 
And wise and right." 



[29] 



£s>tm of Ifgftt 



Lord Shaftesbury used to quote a Scotch proverb — 
" Be aye stickiw in a tree." He icould add, " Some 
one will rest under the branches, if you don't" 
That is the right principle. " One man soiceth and 
another reapeth," but both shall share " in the joy 
of God's harvest." 

" God's love hath in us wealth unheaped: 
Only by giving it is reaped. 
The body withers and the mind 
If pent in by a selfish rind. 

Give thought, give strength, give deeds, give pelf, 
Give love, give tears, and give thyself. 

Grive, give, be always giving: 

Who gives not is not living: 
The more we give the more we live. 
Plant your tree! " 



Ill 

$>tm of iugi)t 




N one of the Psalms we are 
told that light is sown for the 
righteous and gladness for 
the upright in heart. There 
is nothing remarkable in the 
assurance of light and gladness for the faith- 
ful, — that is the teaching of the whole Bible. 
The remarkable thing in the promise is the 
way the light and gladness are said to come. 
" Light is sown for the righteous." The 
figure of sowing is striking, — light coming 
in seeds, planted like wheat, to grow up for 
us out of the soil. Our blessings are sown 
for us and grow in fields and gardens, and we 
gather them as we reap the harvests or pluck 
lovely flowers. 

This means that the good things of our 
lives do not come to us full-grown, but as 
seeds. We know what a seed is. It contains 
only in germ the plant, the tree, or the 

[33] 



C^e iseaut? of dEfoer? J®ty 

flower which is to be. In this way all earthly 
life begins. When God w T ants to give an oak 
to the forest, he does not set out a great tree ; 
he plants an acorn. When he would have a 
harvest of golden wheat waving on the field, 
he does not work a miracle and have it spring 
up over night — he puts into the farmer's 
hands a bushel of wheat grains to scatter in 
the furrows. The same law holds in the 
moral and spiritual life. " The kingdom of 
heaven is like unto a grain of mustard seed, 
which a man took, and sowed in his field: 
which . . . becometh a tree." So a noble 
life begins in a little seed, a mere point of 
life. It is at first only a thought, a sugges- 
tion, a desire, then a decision, a holy purpose. 
God sows light and gladness for us. He 
gives us blessings as seeds, which he buries 
in the furrows of our lives, or hides in the soil, 
so that they may grow and in due time de- 
velop into beauty and fruitfulness. When 
you look at a seed you do not see all the 
splendor which will unfold from it at length. 
All you see is a little brown and unsightly 

[34] 



^eeog of Htg^t 



hull which gives no prophecy of the beauty 
which will spring from it when it is planted 
and dies and grows up. Many of the beams 
of light, — comfort, strength, joy, and good, 
that now are so prominent in your life, came 
to you at first as unwelcome things. They 
did not shine as beams of radiant light. They 
were not glad things. They may have been 
burdens, disappointments, sufferings, losses, 
but they were seeds with life in them. God 
was sowing light and gladness for you in 
these experiences which were so unwelcome, 
so hard to endure. 

There are many ways in which God has 
sown light in the past. Think of the seeds of 
light sown in the creation and preparation 
of the earth to be our home. In the account 
of creation, we have a wonderful glimpse of 
the divine heart and of God's love for man, 
his child. The building of the earth was no 
accident. It did not spring into being and 
develop into beauty without thought and pur- 
pose. There was divine design in it. From 
the beginning, God meant the earth to be the 

[35] 



€^e beauty of cftjer? &a? 

home of his children, and so we find love- 
thoughts everywhere. God looked forward 
and put in provisions, planned conveniences, 
stored blessings that would make the earth 
ages afterward a happy home for his chil- 
dren, lacking nothing. 

We have it in the Genesis story. There 
was only chaos. " The earth was waste and 
void ; and darkness was upon the face of the 
deep." A marginal reading is, " The Spirit 
of God was brooding upon the face of the 
waters." The picture which the words sug- 
gest is that of a hen sitting on her nest, 
covering her eggs with her wings, brooding 
over them. So God brooded over the chaos 
of the world he was preparing, thinking in 
love of his children to be asons hence, and 
planning for their happiness and good. 

Through all the great ages of world- 
building, we find evidences of this divine 
brooding and forethought. Think of all the 
beauty put into the earth which was to be 
man's home, of all the good and useful things 
stored in nature for man's comfort, ages 

[36] 



$>tm of ifj$t 



before there was a man on the earth. Think, 
for instance, of the vast beds of coal laid up 
among earth's strata, that our homes might 
be warm and bright in these late centuries. 
Think of the minerals piled away in the rocks, 
of electricity stored in exhaustless measures 
and kept hidden until these modern days, to 
be of such incalculable service to mankind. 
Look at the springs of water opened on every 
hillside ; note the provision in every clime and 
zone for man's food and raiment. All this 
marvellous preparation was made ages before 
man's creation. It was God sowing seeds of 
light and gladness, that in due time they 
might grow and fill the world with good. 

Or think of the way Jesus Christ sowed 
light and gladness for his people in his incar- 
nation. What was he doing in those beautiful 
years of his, those days of sharp temptation, 
those hours of suffering? He was sowing 
seeds of light and gladness, the blessings of 
whose brightness we are receiving now. Or 
think of the divine promises as seeds of light, 
seeds of gladness, sown in the fields of the 

[37] 



C^e OBeautv of (Bbtxy l®ay 

holy word. Wherever they grow they yield 
joy and beauty. Deserts are made to blos- 
som as the rose, wherever the sower goes forth 
to sow. 

God's sowing was not all in the past, in 
forethought. He is sowing light and glad- 
ness for us every day. Every duty given to 
us is a seed of light, sown for us. We may 
not see the shining in it as it first presents 
itself. Many of us do not like duty. We 
prefer to follow our own inclinations. A 
good woman, speaking of something some 
one was urging her to do and which she was 
trying to evade, said, " I suppose it must be 
my duty, I hate it so." Ofttimes our duties 
at first seem distasteful, even repulsive. They 
have no attraction for us. But when we ac- 
cept them and do them, they are transformed. 
We then begin to see good in them, blessing 
to ourselves, help to others. Seeds are some- 
times dark and rough as we look at them, but 
when they are planted there emerges a beauti- 
ful tree or a lovely flower. So disagreeable 
tasks when done appear bright and glad. 

[38] 



^>eeD$ of tigftt 



One tells of a homely picture which should 
hearten humdrum life. It shows a poor, 
discouraged-looking horse in a treadmill. 
Round and round he tramps in the hot, dusty 
ring, not weary only, we might say, of the 
toil, but also of its endlessness and its boot- 
lessness. Yet there is more of the picture. 
The horse is harnessed to a beam from which 
a rope reaches down the hill to the river's 
edge, and there it is seen that the animal is 
hoisting stones to build a great bridge, on 
which by and by trains will run, carrying a 
wealth of human life and commerce. This 
transforms the horse's treadmill tramping 
into something worth while. It is not bootless. 
Good comes out of it. 

There are men and women in workshops, 
in homes, in trades, in the professions, in 
Christian life's service, who sometimes grow 
weary of the drudgery, the routine, the self- 
denial, the endlessness of their tasks, with 
never a word of praise or commendation to 
cheer them. But if we could see to what these 
unhonored toils and self-denials reach, what 

[39] 



they accomplish, the blessings they carry to 
others, the bridges they help to build on 
which others cross to better things, the picture 
would be transformed. It is in these com- 
monplace tasks, these lowly ministries, that 
we find life's true beauty and glory. 

" God's angels drop like grains of gold 
Our duties midst life's shining sands, 

And from them, one by one, we mould 
Our own bright crowns with patient hands. 

a From dust and dross we gather them ; 
We toil and stoop for love's sweet sake 

To find each worthy act a gem 

In glory's kingly diadem 
Which we may daily richer make." 

Every duty, however unwelcome, is a seed 
of light. To evade it or neglect it is to miss 
a blessing ; to do it is to have the rough seed 
burst into beauty in the heart and life of the 
doer. We are continually coming up to stern 
and severe things, and often we are tempted 
to decline doing them. If we yield to such 
temptations, we shall reap no joy from God's 
sowing of light for us ; but if we take up the 

[40] 



^>eeD$ of JLtg^t 



hard task, whatever it is, and do it cheerfully, 
we shall find blessing. Our duties are seeds 
of light. 

God sows his seeds of light and gladness 
also in the providences of our lives. They do 
not always seem bright and good at the time. 
Sometimes, indeed, we cannot see anything 
beautiful in them, or anything good. For 
example, Joseph's kidnapping and carrying 
into Egypt. No one supposes that the boy 
saw anything happy or radiant in the things 
that befell him at the hands of his brothers. 
There could scarcely have been the slightest 
gladness in his heart as he found himself hope- 
lessly in the hands of his enemies. Yet that 
strange experience in the boy's life was really 
a seed of light. It was only a seed, however, 
at the time. It seemed then the utmost cruelty 
in the men who did it. Some people ask 
about such a murderous piece of inhumanity, 
" How can God be kind, and permit such 
wickedness? " Still it was a seed of light and 
gladness. God used that terrible crime to 
enfold in itself a great blessing. Twenty 

[41] 



C^e "Beauty of €Uty J®ay 

years or so afterwards the seed had grown 
into a plant of good and blessing. 

Some of the providences in all our lives 
come to us first in alarming and forbidding 
form. They are seeds of light which God has 
sown, but the light is not apparent. They 
come to us in losses, sufferings, disappoint- 
ments. Yet they are seeds of light, and in 
due time the light will break out. At first 
they seem only destructive, but afterward 
blessing appears in them. We dread adver- 
sity, but when its work is finished, we find 
that we are enriched in heart and life. We 
are reluctant to accept painful providences ; 
afterward we learn that our disappointments 
are divine appointments. 

God is ever bringing good to us, never evil. 
He goes before us and scatters the furrows 
full of seeds, seeds of light. It is not visible 
light that he scatters, but dull seeds, carrying 
hidden in them the secret of light. Then by 
and by, as we come after him, the light in 
the seeds breaks forth, just at the right time, 
and our way is made bright. There is not a 

[42] 



^>tm of ifg^t 



single dark spot in all our path, if only we 
are living righteously. There are places 
which seem dark as we approach them. We 
are afraid, and ask, " How can I ever get 
through that point of gloom? " But when 
we come to it, the light shines out and it is 
radiant as day. 

According to the old legend, our first parent 
was in great dread as the first evening of his 
life approached. The sun was about to set. 
He trembled at the thought of the disaster 
which would follow. But the sun went down 
silently, and lo ! ten thousand stars flashed 
out. The darkness revealed more than it hid. 
So, for every darkness in our life, God has 
stars of light ready to shine. 

We need never dread hardness, for it is 
in the hard experiences that the seeds of light 
are hidden. The best things never are the 
easiest things. The best men are not grown 
in luxury and self-indulgence. We dread 
crosses, but it is only in cross-bearing that 
we find life's real treasures. In every cross 
God hides his seeds of radiant light. Accept 

[43] 



€^e TStauty of <£totty J&w 

the cross, take it up, and the light will shine 
out. 

God wants us to go forth every day as 
sowers of light and gladness. Whether we 
mean it so, or not, we are sowers, every one 
of us, every day of our life, every step of our 
way. The question is, What kinds of seeds 
do we sow? The Master, in one of his little 
stories, tells us of an enemy who, after the 
farmer had scattered good seed over his field, 
came stealthily and secretly sowed tares 
among the wheat. What seed did you 
sow yesterday? Did you plant only pure 
thoughts, good thoughts, holy thoughts, 
white, clean thoughts, gentle, loving thoughts, 
in the gardens of people's lives where you 
sowed? It is a pitiful thing for any one 
to put an evil thought into the mind of 
another. 

God wants us to sow only good seeds. 
Seeds of light! He wants us to make this 
world brighter. Seeds of gladness ! He 
wants us to make the world happier. Some 
people do neither. They sow gloom, discour- 

[44] 



^>eei>0 of itg^t 



agement, wherever they go. They sow sad- 
ness, pain, grief. If we are this kind of sower, 
we are missing our mission, we are disap- 
pointing God, we are making the world less 
bright and less happy. 

But think of one who, wherever he goes, 
sows only seeds of light and gladness. His 
life is pure, for only pure hands can sow seeds 
of light. He is a sincere lover of men, as his 
Master was. He never thinks of himself. He 
never spares himself when any other needs his 
service. He is anxious only to do good to 
others, to make them better, to make them 
gladder. Let us be sowers of light and of 
gladness always and everywhere. Thus shall 
we help Christ to change deserts into rose 
gardens and to fill the world with light and 
love. 



[45] 



l$t Call* m ftitnttf 



The world remembers, In that year 

A nation/ 's splendid victory; 
The year I first beheld your face 
Is all it means to me. 

Another year. How could I reck 

War, famine, earthquake, aught beside? 
My heart knows only one event — 
It was the year you died. 



When, Lord, shall I be fit — when wilt 

Thou call me friend? 
Wilt Thou not one day, Lord? 




IV 

l^e Calls m tfrienDg 

HEN Jesus called his dis- 
ciples his friends, he meant 
that he was also their friend. 
Then he intimates something 
of the meaning of his friend- 
ship for them when he says that he called them 
no longer his slaves, but his friends. There 
is a vast difference in the two. The slave 
does not have the master's confidence. He 
is only a piece of property. He has no 
rights, no privileges, is never consulted 
about anything, has no share in the mat- 
ters considered, no liberty of opinion even 
regarding his own work. A friend, how- 
ever, is taken into equality, into comrade- 
ship, then into confidence. He is conferred 
with, is a partner in his friend's affairs. 
Friendship with Christ gives thus the highest 
exaltation possible to any man. How com- 
monplace are the loftiest elevations of earth 

[49] 



C^e "Beaut? of €Uty 2£a? 

compared with the privilege of being a friend 
of Christ! 

But is Christ the friend of his followers in 
these days? Is it possible for the Christian 
to establish a personal friendship with Jesus 
Christ like that which John and Peter had 
with him ? Yes ; he died, then rose again and 
ever lives, walking with us on the earth, our 
companion, our friend. There is no other 
one who can be to us the one thousandth part 
in closeness, in intimacy, in fellowship, that 
Christ can be. He is the realest friend any 
of us can have. 

Think what Jesus was as a friend to the 
poor people to whose door he came in the days 
of his flesh. Perhaps he did not seem to do 
much for them. He did not build them any 
larger or better houses, nor give them richer 
food, nor make softer beds for them to sleep 
on, nor weave for them finer, warmer gar- 
ments to wear. He was not what men call a 
philanthropist. He endowed no institutions of 
charity. A recent writer says : " The Son 
of man was dowered at birth above the rest 

[50] 



f e Calls m tfrteutig 



with the impulse and the power to love and to 
minister. . . . His compassion for the multi- 
tude because they were distressed and scat- 
tered as sheep not having a shepherd, his 
charity for the outcast, the oppressed, and the 
weary, his affection for the innocence of child- 
hood, are among the tenderest and sweetest 
chapters in the history of our race, and seem 
to have made the profoundest impression both 
upon those whose exceeding fortune it was to 
see his human countenance, and upon the ages 
that came after." 

The friendship of Jesus to the common 
people was not shown in what he did in mate- 
rial ways, nor in what he took away of the 
common burdens, the hardness, the wrongs 
they suffered, but in his sympathy for them, 
in the cheer and courage he put into their 
hearts, in the peace within which he imparted, 
which made them better able to go on in their 
lives of toil and struggle. So it is that to-day 
the friendship of Christ is at work among 
people, making them braver to bear their bur- 
dens. Nothing does so much to help those 

[51] 



C^e 'Beaut? of €btty 1®ay 

who suffer as to know that somebody cares. 
The most that even Christian teaching can do 
ofttimes is to assure the struggling world that 
Christ feels and sympathizes. 

Think what the friendship of Jesus did for 
his disciples. They were not great men, wise, 
or cultured. Dr. W. J. Dawson says of him, 
" He spent his wealth of intellect upon infe- 
rior persons, — fishermen and the like, who 
did not comprehend one tithe of what he 
said." This means that his personality was 
the chief power of attraction in him, — that 
his gentleness, faith, and goodness were more 
influential than even his gracious wofds. The 
apostles were drawn and influenced, no doubt, 
more by the man himself than by the great- 
ness of his words. Men who could not under- 
stand his wonderful teachings were blessed, 
comforted, cheered, uplifted by the power of 
his personality. It was wonderful how they 
were transformed, made great, by their com- 
panionship with this " Poet of Galilee." 

Take Peter. When he was first brought to 
him, Jesus saw a man full of faults, — rude, 

[52] 



f e Callg m iff tfentjg 



undisciplined, unlettered, rash, impetuous. 
Nobody dreamed of the rough, blustering old 
fisherman as having any promise of good, of 
beauty, or of greatness in him. Nobody 
thought he would be one of earth's strongest 
men in future years, with influence reaching 
all over the world. But the moment Jesus 
saw him he said, "Thou art Simon: thou 
shalt be called Peter." He saw in this man 
cf the fishing-boat possibilities of large- 
heartedness, of noble leadership, of power 
and influence, of sublime apostleship. We 
know what Simon was in his rude beginnings 
and what he became through Christ's making 
of him. Had Jesus not found him and be- 
come his friend, he would have lived and died 
as a rough, uncultured fisherman, for a few 
years casting his nets into the Sea of Galilee, 
then dying unhonored and being buried in an 
unmarked grave beside the lake. His name 
never would have been known in the world. 
All that Peter is to-day is the fruit of the 
friendship of Christ for him. 

Or think what the friendship of Jesus was 
[53] 



C^e TStwty of (fctexy l®ay 

to John. He was one of the first two who 
came to Jesus. Several hours were spent in 
an interview one afternoon. What took place 
in that blessed experience we do not know, 
but we are sure that John received impres- 
sions and impulses that day which changed 
all his life. It seems that John was originally 
intolerant, fiery, resentful. But all his fierce- 
ness was cured by the gentle and softening 
friendship of Jesus, which lay about him 
continually like an atmosphere of summer. 
John's influence in the world has been mar- 
vellous. It has been like a holy fragrance, 
breathing everywhere, sweetening the air, 
softening human hardness, making men 
gentler. 

The friendship of Jesus was not always 
soft and easy. Sometimes it seemed stern and 
severe. " Think not," he said, " that I came 
to send peace on the earth: I came not to 
send peace, but a sword." This word ap- 
pears to break like a false note in a Gospel 
whose keynote was peace. Yet there is work 
for the sword even in love's ministry. Hu- 

[54] 



$t Calls m tfrienDg 

man friendships sometimes err in over-gentle- 
ness. Faithful friendship is sometimes re- 
quired to speak the word of rebuke, though it 
should always be in love. Christ loves us too 
well not to smite the evil he sees in us. His 
holiness is the enemy of everything in our life 
that is not beautiful and good. For what- 
ever then there is in us that is wrong, he 
brings the sword. We are not perfect, and 
cannot be perfect until every evil element is 
thrust out. Christ would not be our truest 
friend if he sent peace to our hearts when 
they were cherishing pride, self-conceit, and 
selfishness. Love must come then first as a 
sword. 

There is much mystery in the friendship 
of Christ. Perhaps no question is asked more 
frequently than " Why does Christ send us 
suffering or pain? " In one of the Gospels 
there is an illustration of the dealing of 
Christ's friendship, which may help us to see 
love in the pain and sorrow. It is in the 
story of the Bethany family. The brother 
fell sick. Jesus was absent. A messenger 

[55] 



C^e TStwty of €iotty ^a? 

was sent to tell him, " He whom thou lovest is 
sick." We would say he would start at once 
and travel in haste to get to his friend as soon 
as possible. But the record reads strangely 
indeed, — " When therefore he heard that he 
was sick, he abode at that time two days in 
the place where he was." That is, because 
he loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, he 
waited two whole days after hearing of his 
friend's illness, before he started to go to him. 
It was not accidental that he did not get to 
Bethany in time. It was not neglect in his 
love. It was not want of interest in his 
friends. The delay was part of his friend- 
ship. Nothing went wrong, therefore, with 
his love, when he did not come for four days 
and Lazarus died. Nothing went wrong in 
your home when your prayer was not an- 
swered at once and your friend died. It was 
all love. 

We know much about friendship in this 
world — far more than we think we know. 
Our friends mean more to us by far than we 
dream they do. Here is a bit of verse which 

[56] 



f e Calls m tfrtenfcg 



gives us a glimpse of what many a friend 
means to those he loves : 

"The world is not so difficult to-day 

As in those far-off days before I knew 
I might look forward, all the long years through, 
Unto the thought of thee — let come what may. 

" The loneliness from grief has gone away 

Since now its coming brings thee to my side; 
And Pain its sternest secrets seems to hide, 
And doubt to vanish, if thou wilt but stay. 

" And as the traveller in a desert land, 

Longing for shelter from the heat above, 
At length finds refuge 'neath some great rock's 
shade ; 
So when life's stress I may not well withstand, 
I seek the memory of thy strengthening love, — 
And in the thought of thee am unafraid." 

Our friends make us strong. In fear 
and danger they are a refuge to us. In 
suffering they comfort us, perhaps, not by 
what they say to us or do for us, but just 
by what they are. Ofttimes our friend 
is a hiding place for us, and this is one 
of the offices of Christ as our Friend — 
we may hide in him. Christ's companion- 

[57] 



€^e QBeauty of €Uty 3®ay 

ship is a refuge in which we may find shelter 
in loneliness. 

You are in some great sorrow. The words 
of the people who are trying to console you 
seem only empty echoes. Then one comes in 
who has been with you in deep experiences of 
trial in the past, one who knows you and loves 
you and whom you love. There is sympathy 
in his eye, there is comfort in his words. You 
have found a refuge, and hide away in your 
friend's presence. So Christ is a hiding place 
for us in whatever experiences of trouble, 
loneliness, or sorrow we may ever find our- 
selves. An old prophet gives a picture of a 
glorious sheltering manhood : " A man shall be 
as a hiding place from the wind, and a covert 
from the tempest, as streams of water in a dry 
place, as the shade of a great rock in a weary 
land." There are some men who are indeed 
all this in a measure to their fellows. Nearly 
every one of us knows some one who is 
a hiding place to us from the fierce winds 
of life, a covert to us from the wild tem- 
pest, like the shadow of a great rock in 

[58] 



f e Calls m fvitnhz 



a weary land, like a well of water in a 
place of thirst. But this wonderful pic- 
ture is realized in full measure in only one 
Man who ever lived. We thank God for 
the human friends who mean so much to us, 
in whose strong friendship we may hide 
ourselves in all the bitter hours of life, and 
who never fail us. But we thank God most 
of all for the Man Jesus Christ, in whose 
friendship we find fulness of sympathy, of 
strength, of tenderness. 

What a fearful thing sin is ! How it im- 
perils our lives ! We may hide our secret sins 
from our human friends. We would not want 
to have our hearts photographed, with all 
their spots and evils, their jealousies, envies, 
meannesses, suspicions, bad motives, — all our 
secret life, — and then have the photograph 
held up before the eyes of our neighbors. 
We would not dare trust even our nearest 
loved ones to see all this and be sure that they 
would still be our friends. But Christ sees 
this picture all the while, sees all the evil 
that is hidden in us — sees all, knows all, 

[59] 



C^e istauty of €tozty 3®ay 

— and is still our Friend. We do not 
need to try to hide our weaknesses, our 
failures, from him. Oh, the comfort, the 
inexpressible comfort of feeling safe, abso- 
lutely safe, with Christ, from whose love 
nothing can separate! 



[60] 



$ot Counting <0oi> 



Behind the dim unknown 
Standeth God within the shadow 
Keeping watch above his own. 

LOWELL. 



We plan — and plan: "This shall be so — and so. 
This shall I do," and " Thither shall I go." 
Yet, as the hours shape themselves to days, 
We tread not in those same self -chosen ways; 
Our feet are led Hong paths we had not guessed, 
And lo! we find those newer paths are best! 



®ot Counting (0oD 




EN do not have the last word 
in this world's affairs. The 
human hand is not omnipo- 
tent. Forty men had bound 
themselves in a conspiracy 
to kill St. Paul and they were sure their plot 
could not fail. But a boy heard of the con- 
spiracy, and the apostle was rescued. By 
nine o'clock that night he was on his way to 
Caesarea, under strong military protection. 
The forty men had everything in their favor, 
but — they had not thought about God. If 
it had not been for God, their plot would have 
succeeded. 

Not to take account of God in our plans 
is folly. Dr. Howard Agnew Johnston tells 
of a conversation he had with a well-known 
manufacturer during a journey to Europe. 
They were talking of missions, and reference 
was made to India. The business man said, 

[63] 



€^e Beaut? of €Utv 2^a? 

" Why, doctor, it will be ten thousand years 
before India becomes Christian." " Do you 
not think you are drawing a hard line on 
God? " asked the minister. " Oh, I forgot 
about him," was the reply. " Then," said 
Dr. Johnston, " you can make it ten million 
years if you leave him out." 

That is what men are doing all the time. 
They forget about God in making their plans 
and calculations. These forty men never 
thought of God's interfering in their con- 
spiracy. They forgot all about him. There 
are people to-day who laugh at our belief in 
God. They tell us that the hopes we cherish 
never can be realized, that we are only believ- 
ing dreams. What they say would be true if 
there were no God. Human skill, wisdom, or 
power never could bring these glorious things 
to pass. If there were no God, not one hope 
of our Christian faith could find its fulfil- 
ment. But there is a God, — a God of love, 
of power, — and he is the hearer of prayer. 

In this incident in St. Paul's life we see 
God working silently and invisibly. The 

[64] 



$ot Counting c0oD 



night before the plot was made the Lord ap- 
peared to St. Paul, in his prison, in the dark- 
ness, and said to him, " Be of good cheer: for 
as thou hast testified for me at Jerusalem, so 
must thou bear witness also at Rome." This 
was assurance that he could not be killed by 
the forty men who had conspired to assault 
him the next day. When Christ has work 
for a man somewhere next year, no man can 
kill him this year. " Every man is immortal 
till his work is done." 

We do not know how St. Paul's sister's son 
came to be at Jerusalem just at that time. 
God always finds ways of doing what he wants 
to have done. His hand is on all events. All 
things serve him. We say it chanced that the 
young man was in Jerusalem that day; it 
chanced that he learned in some way of the 
plot. We use the word chance because we 
have no better word to use. It was only 
chance so far as men knew, but we know that 
God was in it all. The young man became 
God's agent in the matter. When he heard 
of the plot, he hastened to his uncle and in 

[65] 



C^e Beaut? of Cbetv ?^ai? 

great alarm told him of it. St. Paul sent him 
to the Roman officer. The officer chanced to 
be a kindly man, and gave the boy courteous 
attention. At once he set in motion the ma- 
chinery to get this prisoner away from the 
city. If it had not been for God, St. Paul 
would have been killed. But since there is a 
God, whose plans go on through all human 
plots and schemes, he was delivered and 
set one step farther on his way toward 
Rome, where he was to witness for his 
Lord. 

Earlier in the Acts we have the story of 
Herod's attempt to destroy the apostles. To 
begin with, he killed James. He then had 
Peter also arrested and cast into prison, 
meaning to have him beheaded after the Pass- 
over. The record says, " Peter therefore 
was kept in the prison : but prayer was made 
earnestly of the church unto God for him." 
Everything in Herod's schedule seemed sure. 
The prison was strong, a double guard 
watched the prisoner inside the dungeon. 
Guards also stood before the door. Peter 

[66] 



$ot Counting d&oD 



could not possibly escape, Herod supposed; 
but he had not thought about God. 

Some time during the night an angel came, 
unheard and unseen, into the prison. Peter 
was sleeping between his two guards. The 
angel touched him, awoke him, and bade him 
arise. As he did so, the chains fell off. " Fol- 
low me," said the angel ; and as he did so, the 
doors and gates opened silently — the guards 
sleeping on — and soon Peter was outside 
and among his friends. He would have been 
killed in the morning had it not been for God. 
But when God had other plans for his ser- 
vant, no prison walls, no chains, no double 
guard of soldiers could keep him, and no 
tyrant's sword could touch his life. 

We believe these Scripture narratives of 
deliverance. But somehow we get the im- 
pression that the times then were special, dif- 
ferent from our times, and that the men who 
were thus delivered were God's servants in 
a peculiar sense. We cannot quite realize 
that it is the same in these times, that God 
is as active now in human affairs as he was 

[67] 



C^e ^Beauty of (fcbzvy l^ay 

then. But there are just as many miracles 
of protection and deliverance in your life as 
there were in the lives of Christ's friends in 
those days. You do not know from what 
dangers you are sheltered every day. You 
do not know how often you would be harmed 
in some way if it were not for God. 

It will do us good to get anew into our 
hearts this fact of God in all our life. Some 
people are always afraid of the dangers 
about them. They are afraid of sickness, of 
trouble, of pain, of the darkness, of accidents, 
of death. But there really never is any rea- 
son for fear if we have God. When evil is 
plotting against you and the plot is closing, 
and you are about to be destroyed, God comes 
in and you are delivered. 

What, then, is the true way of living? It is 
to go quietly on in obedience, in faithfulness, 
in trust, asking no questions, having no fears, 
letting God care for us in his own way. This 
does not mean that we shall never suffer, that 
pain, sorrow, or death shall never touch us. 
Not all believers in the New Testament days 

[68] 



$ot Counting (Boo 



were delivered from the plots of enemies. 
James was killed, while Peter was led by an 
angel out of the prison, and lived for many 
years. Stephen was not rescued from mar- 
tyrdom, but was left to die. St. Paul himself, 
saved many times from death, at last was be- 
headed. While a Christian man's work is still 
unfinished, there is no power that can strike 
him down. Back of all men's plots and 
schemes stands God, and no human hatred can 
beat down any one of his until he wills it. 
Jesus told Pilate that he could have no power 
to crucify him until it were given to him from 
God. When a true Christian is allowed to 
suffer, it is because God permits it, because it 
is God's will, and then it is a blessing. When 
a faithful follower of Christ meets accident, 
when in some catastrophe he loses his life, or 
when he is suddenly taken away, nothing has 
gone wrong with God's plans. God is not 
surprised or shocked as we are. No break in 
his plan has occurred. The man's death 
leaves nothing unfinished that it was meant 
he should do. Our plans are broken continu- 

[69] 



Ctye "Beaut? of ttozty &ay 

ally by life's changes, accidents, interrup- 
tions, and vicissitudes, but God's great plan 
is never broken. 

Never leave God out in making your plans. 
Never be discouraged when you are faithfully 
following Christ, though all things seem to 
be against you. In the darkest hour be of 
good cheer. God's plan for your life in- 
cludes these very things which so discourage 
you, takes them in as part of his thought, 
and not one of them can mar the perfectness 
or the beauty of your life when it is finished. 
Let us meet all the hard things as parts of 
God's plan. Plots against us shall fail to 
harm us. This is our Father's world, and 
there is no power in it which ever gets out of 
his hand. Everywhere standeth God within 
the shadow, keeping watch above his own. 

His assassins thought they were absolutely 
sure of St. Paul's death next morning, but 
they had not thought about God. The busi- 
ness man said that India could not be made 
Christian in ten thousand years. But he had 
not thought about God. You are dreading 

[70] 



$ot Counting (0oD 



something to-day, — the passing of some 
dream that is most dear, the losing of some 
joy that appears to be slipping away from 
you. But you have not thought about God. 
You have left him out, forgetting his might, 
his love, his wisdom, his power. He can pro- 
tect you from the danger you are dreading. 
He can keep for you the joy you fear losing, 
if this is his purpose for you. He can do for 
you the things you long to have done. In the 
silence, unseen, stands God. 

You are facing some duty which you feel 
you ought to do, but when you think of it, it 
seems so stupendous, so difficult, to require 
such ability, such wisdom, such self-sacrifice, 
that you say : " I cannot do it. It is impos- 
sible for me. I have not the strength for it. 
I am not wise enough." You are forgetting 
about God. With him nothing is impossible. 

You are facing a costly sacrifice. It is a 
question of loyalty to truth and right. Per- 
haps it is something which concerns your 
occupation by which you make a living for 
your family. If you do right, you will give 

[71] 



C^e OBeauty of €\>zty l®ay 

this up. If it were for yourself alone, you 
would not hesitate an instant, but the bread 
for your wife and children also depends on 
what you do. Yet you need not question. 
God is with you. 

You are not yet a Christian. You say you 
never can be a Christian. You hear it said 
that a Christian is one who loves — loves his 
fellow-men. You think of what it is to love. 
" Love suffereth long, and is kind ; love envi- 
eth not; is not puffed up, doth not behave 
itself unseemly, seeketh not its own. 55 You 
read further that love is gentle, forgiving, 
patient. As you think of the high ideal of 
Christian life which Christ sets, you grow 
alarmed. " I never can reach that sort of 
life, 55 you say. " I never can love people that 
way. I never can be forgiving to those who 
wrong me. There is no use trying — I can- 
not be a Christian. 55 But you are not think- 
ing of God. You have left him out in trying 
to solve the problem. Of course you cannot 
change your own heart, you cannot trans- 
form your own life, you cannot make yourself 

[72] 



$ot Counting <E»oD 



sweet, gentle, patient, beautiful; you cannot 
make the ugly things in your disposition, in 
your temper, in your heart, Christlike. Oh, 
no; but do not forget about God. He can 
make your character lovely with his own love- 
liness. Do not leave God out. 

You are standing before some great ques- 
tion, some question which seems to you to 
involve your heart's happiness for all the 
future. You are vexing yourself over it. 
You are rent by conflicting emotions about 
it. Are you forgetting about God and leav- 
ing him out of this problem? He knows what 
will be best for you. He has a plan for your 
life, a plan which includes this very mat- 
ter. Do not try to answer the question your- 
self. Wait. Nothing is settled right until it 
is settled in God's wise and best way. 

How safe we are from all evil, since God 
has our lives and our interests in his hands, 
in his wisdom and love! What peace it gives 
us in sorrow, suffering, and wrong, and in the 
enduring of injustice, to know that our times 
are in God's hands ! What comfort we have 

[73] 



€^e "Beaut? of €Uty 3®ay 

when we realize that God is in all our lives, 
in all events, in all our circumstances, that 
daily Providence is simply God working with 
us and for us, making all things to work to- 
gether for good to all who love him. We need 
never leave God out of anything. 

Why can we not make God more real in our 
lives? We have him in our creeds, in our 
hymns, in our prayers, in our talk. We say 
God is our Father. We say he will care for 
us. We say we will trust him. But some- 
times in the face of danger, need, loss, or sor- 
row, we forget that he is with us. We cry 
out in our distress. We think all is lost. Let 
us train ourselves to make God real in our 
lives, to practise his presence. He stands un- 
seen, close beside us. Why should we ever be 
afraid? We get discouraged when we see 
chaos about us, — old beliefs disbelieved, ag- 
nosticism lifting up its voice, anarchy prating 
and making its assaults. Yes, but do not get 
discouraged. Do not leave God out. He 
holds the winds in his fists, and the waters in 
the hollow of his hand. The clamor and tur- 

[74] 



$ot Counting <0oD 



bulence of men are nothing in his omnipotent 
hand. We are safe even in the most trouble- 
some times. 

" The lark 's on the wing, 
The morning 's at seven, 
The hillside 's dew-pearled, 
God 's in his heaven, 
All 's right with the world." 



[75] 



perfection in totoing 



" While I love my God the most, I deem 
That I can never love you overmuch: 
I love him more, so let me love you, too. 
Yea, as I understand it, love is such, 
I cannot love you if I love not him; 
I cannot love him if I love not you" 



" Where am I going tot Never mind; 
Just follow the sign-board that says ' Be kind, 9 
And do the duty that nearest lies, 
For that is the pathway to Paradise" 



VI 



perfection in noting 




ESUS taught that Christian 
perfection is perfection in 
loving. He said we are to 
love our enemies and pray 
for them that persecute us, 
that we may be sons of our Father, who is in 
heaven. Then he added, " Ye therefore shall 
be perfect." He also gave some specific 
suggestions of the working of this law of love, 
showing what it includes. 

It was the teaching of the times that men 
should treat others as others treated them. 
" An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," 
was the way it was put. But Jesus said, 
" That is not the meaning of love. I say unto 
you, Resist not him that is evil: but who- 
soever smiteth thee on the right cheek, turn 
to him the other also." People say that of 
course he did not mean he would do this lit- 
erally. If not, just what did he mean? If 

[79] 



C^e istauty of ttety J®ay 

some one were to smite you on the right cheek, 
what ought you to do? What would Jesus 
himself do? It is not in civilized countries in 
our times that one actually strikes another 
in the face ; but what kind of treatment does 
face-smiting stand for? It may be regarded 
as a type of anything of the nature of per- 
sonal insult, wrong, or indignity. If we would 
know just what Jesus would do in a case like 
this, we have an actual illustration in his own 
life. When he was on his trial, an officer 
smote him on the cheek with his hand. Did 
Jesus literally turn the other cheek? No; he 
asked the officer why he had smitten him. 
There was no anger in the question — it was 
not a hot word that he spoke. He did not 
return the blow. He showed no temper. He 
bore the insult without resentment, without 
bitterness, only challenging its justice. 

When we study Christ's conduct in all his 
life and note what he did when he was wronged 
or insulted, when they spat in his face and 
buffeted him, we find that he was always most 
gentle and patient in return. He did not re- 

[80] 



perfection in Hobfttg 



sist him that was evil. He did not contend 
for his rights. He endured wrongs without 
complaining. When he was reviled, he reviled 
not again. When he suffered cruelty or in- 
justice he threatened not. There are certain 
trees which, when struck, bathe with fragrant 
sap the axe that cuts into them. Thus it was 
with Jesus when he was hurt — it only 
brought out in him more tenderness, more 
sweetness of love. When they drove nails 
into his hands and feet, the blood that flowed 
became the blood of redemption. 

In all this manifesting, Jesus was God, 
showing how God loves. " He that hath seen 
me hath seen the Father." We are to love as 
Christ loved. It is said that one day an aide- 
de-camp of the Emperor Nicolas threw him- 
self at his sovereign's feet in great excitement 
and begged that he might be allowed to fight 
a duel. The emperor emphatically refused to 
grant the request. " But I have been dis- 
honored ; I must fight ! " cried the young offi- 
cer. The czar asked him what he meant. " I 
have been struck in the face," he answered. 

[81] 



C^e iszauty of <&Uvy j®ay 

" Well," said the emperor, " for all that, thou 
shalt not fight. But come with me." Taking 
the young man by the arm, the emperor led 
him into the presence of the court, which was 
assembled in an adjoining room. He then, 
in the presence of the highest officers of his 
empire, kissed the cheek on which the young 
man had been struck. " The insult has been 
effaced," the emperor said. " Go in peace." 

Thus Christ by his example of patience 
and love teaches us not to take revenge. He 
himself kisses away the stain of dishonor 
which the insult left on us. He makes it no 
longer a dishonor to bear an indignity pa- 
tiently, without anger or retaliation, but the 
highest honor, rather, a mark of godlikeness. 
That is the way God himself does. 

For we can find no place in the world where 
personal wrongs and injuries cannot reach 
us. People will not always deal fairly with 
us. There will be some one who is not gentle, 
some one who will speak words which are 
bitter and unjust, who slights or cuts us, 
who wrongs or insults us, who, as it were, 

[82] 



perfection in Hofoing 



slaps us on the cheek. As Christians, what 
should we do? We know what the world's 
men do in such experiences. Shall we act 
differently? Men of the world think meek- 
ness, patience in enduring wrong, the spirit 
of forgiveness, marks of weakness. Oh, no; 
they are distinctly marks of strength. Re- 
venge is characteristic of the world's people, 
but to be a Christian is to endure wrongs. 
We are to give love for hate, to return good 
for evil. Thus only can we be the sons of 
our Father, and become perfect as he is 
perfect. 

Another duty set down among the laws of 
the kingdom is, loving our enemies. " I say 
unto you, Love your enemies." How many of 
us, who call ourselves Christians, habitually 
do this? How many of us pray for those 
who persecute us ? Yet that is what we must 
do if we would be perfect as our heavenly 
Father is perfect. It is easy enough to love 
certain people and be kind to them. It is 
easy in your evening prayer to ask God to 
bless those who have been kind to you that 

[83] 



C^e TBeaut? of &tety %>ay 

day, who have spoken affectionate words to 
you, who have helped you over the hard 
places, whose love has brightened the way for 
you. But here is one who was unjust to you, 
who treated you rudely, who spoke to you 
or of you bitterly, falsely, who tried in some 
way to injure you. Is it easy, when you 
make your evening prayer, to ask God to 
bless this person and to forgive him, to do 
him good? Yet that is what he requires. 
" Pray for them that persecute you." 

When we have learned to pray really in 
this way, — for those who wrong us, treat us 
injuriously, hate us, — we are Christians. 
That is the way God loves. If we love as he 
loves, we shall be perfect. " Love ... is 
the fulfilment of the law." " God is love," 
and to be like God is to love. Wesley said, 
" Pure love alone, reigning in the heart 
and life — this is the whole of Christian 
perfection." 

The word perfection frightens some people. 
They say they never can reach it. It seems 
an inaccessible mountain summit. But Christ 

[84] 



^etfectfon in Lolling 



never commands an impossibility. When he 
says, " Be ye perfect," he means to give 
grace and ability to reach the high attain- 
ment. He means here especially perfection 
in loving, as defined in his own words. No 
other perfection is attainable. A writer tells 
of the finding of a human skeleton in the Alps. 
It proved to be that of a tourist who had been 
trying to secure an Alpine flower, the edel- 
weiss, but had slipped and lost his life. Many 
men, in striving to reach some high honor, 
some great joy, some rich possession, have 
failed and fallen. Only a few of earth's 
climbers ever gain their goal. But here is 
a white flower which all who aspire to reach 
shall find. " Ye shall be perfect in love as 
your Father is perfect." 

Perfection ever is a lesson which has to be 
learned. It is not an attainment which God 
will put into our hearts, as you might hang 
up a picture in your parlor. Rather, it is 
something which we have to strive after, which 
we have to achieve and attain, in experience. 
If we learn one by one the lessons which our 

[85] 



C^e QBeaut? of €Uxy &>ay 

Master teaches us, we shall at length become 
perfect. It may seem now only a far-away 
vision, but if we continue patiently learning 
we shall realize it by and by. We cannot at- 
tain it in a day, but every day we may take 
one little step toward it. The day in which 
we do not grow a little less resentful, in which 
we do not become a little more patient, toler- 
ant, and merciful toward others, a little more 
like Christ in love, in gentleness and kindness, 
is a lost day. " Ye shall be perfect," — that 
is the finished lesson, that is the radiance of 
character to which we are coming. Every 
hour we should draw a little nearer to it. 
Cherish the blessed vision. Never let it fade 
from your heart for a moment. Every temp- 
tation to be angry is an opportunity to learn 
to live a little better. Every wrong any one 
does to you gives you another chance to grow 
more forgiving, to learn more of meekness and 
long-suffering, to get into your life a larger 
measure of the love that beareth all things, 
endureth all things, never faileth. 

One says : " I never can learn this lesson — 
[86] 



perfection m Lofcmg 



it is too hard. I never can love my enemy, 
one who hates me and treats me with insult. 
I never can cease to bear grudges. If this is 
what the lesson is, I cannot learn to live it." 
Without divine help we never can learn it. The 
evil in our natural hearts we never can erad- 
icate. We cannot change black into white. 

That is just why Jesus came into the world 
to be our Saviour. If we could have changed 
our own hearts, there would have been no need 
for a divine helper to come. We cannot, with- 
out his help, change resentment to love in our 
own hearts. We cannot, without his grace, 
learn to love our enemies, to pray for them. 
We cannot learn to be kind to the unthankful 
and the evil, unless the Spirit of Christ be in 
us. Jesus said to the disciples, " Apart from 
me ye can do nothing." It is not a mere 
human work we are set to do when we are 
bidden to be perfect. We cannot too clearly 
understand this, or too thoroughly remember 
it. But when we are willing, God will work 
with us. If we truly strive to be perfect in 
love, God will help us to reach the lofty aim. 

[87] 



^Ut €^t %>00t 



" Father, I come to thee, , 
Thou hast a place for me. 
Thou wilt forgive the past and give me love. 
So rests my heart in thee, 
So sings my spirit free, 
So may I come to thee, safe home above — 
Safe home above. 

" Now when life's storms are high, 
Straight to thy care I '11 fly, 

There find me rest and peace in thy strong arms. 
Thy help forever nigh, 
Will banish tear and sigh, 

And keep me 'neath thine eye, safe from alarms 
Safe from alarms.'' 



VII 




ESUS gave very definite in- 
structions concerning prayer. 
We are to enter into our in- 
ner chamber and shut the 
door. This does not neces- 
sarily mean that we must actually be in an 
inner room in a house. We may be out in the 
field, in the heart of a forest, or on a quiet 
hillside. When Jesus himself prayed, it was 
often in a garden or on a mountain — some- 
where apart from the multitude. He teaches 
us to do the same. We need to be alone. The 
presence of others disturbs our thoughts. 
We cannot become wholly absorbed in the 
purpose of our errand to God if there are 
others about us. The chatter of voices in- 
terrupts us. 

Prayer is a great deal more than we some- 
times suppose it to be. We may have thought 
of it as little more than a daily routine of 

[91] 



C^e TStauty of duty &>ay 

devotion. We rise in the morning and 
through force of habit kneel down for a min- 
ute or two of what we call praying. We run 
hurriedly through a form of words, without 
giving serious thought to what we are saying. 
We scarcely know when we are through what 
we have asked God for. Indeed our petitions 
were mere rote work — there were no strong 
desires in our hearts, corresponding to the 
words we used. We say we have been pray- 
ing. Have we? That is not what Jesus 
meant when he said, " Enter into thine inner 
chamber, and having shut thy door, pray to 
thy Father." We may have been in the inner 
chamber in a literal sense, and the door may 
have been shut, but we have not been with our 
Father. 

Christ means that when you enter the inner 
room you and God are alone together. The 
world is far away. Its noises break not in 
upon your ear. You have put your business, 
your ambitions, your pleasures, far from you. 
No eye sees you. No ear hears what you say. 
Then God is near and you are alone with him. 

[92] 



^ut C^t &>oov 



When General Gordon was with his army in 
the Soudan, it is said there was half an hour 
each morning when a handkerchief lay outside 
the General's tent, and the whole camp knew 
the meaning of the little signal, and reli- 
giously respected it. No foot dared to enter 
the tent while the handkerchief lay there. 
No sentinels could better have guarded the 
portals. Any message, however pressing, had 
to wait until the signal was lifted. Every one 
knew that God and Gordon were alone to- 
gether within, and not the most thoughtless 
man in the camp would dare intrude. No 
wonder that when the General came out of his 
tent the glory of heaven seemed to shine on 
his face, the fragrance of heaven to cling to 
his garments, and that he had such peace and 
such power in his life. 

We must have the shut door for all the 
most sacred experiences of life. Love will not 
reveal its holiest thoughts in public. Sorrow 
wants to be alone in its deepest moods. We 
wear masks before the world; only when the 
door is shut do we reveal our truest selves. 

[93] 



€^e iszauty of (&Uty %>ay 

There are moments and experiences in real 
true human friendships when two souls are 
alone and come very close together. The door 
is shut upon the outside world. No stranger 
intermeddles. No eye looks in upon the sweet 
communion. No ear hears what the two say 
one to the other. No tongue breaks in with 
any word upon the speech they are having 
together. Their communion seems really full 
and close. 

Yet not even with the most faithful human 
friends is the intimacy ideally perfect. Not 
even our tenderest friends and those closest 
to us, says Keble, know half the reasons 
why we smile or sigh. Every human heart 
is a world by itself. We really understand 
very little of what goes on in the brain and 
breast of the friend we most intimately know. 
You say you are perfectly acquainted with 
your friend. But you are not. You read his 
smiles and you say, " My friend is very 
happy to-day." But in his heart are cares 
and griefs of which you suspect nothing. 
The marriage relation, when it is what it 

[94] 



^ut €^i? ?^oor 



should be, represents the most complete 
blending of lives, and the most intimate mu- 
tual knowledge, the one of the other. " We 
tell each other everything," says a happy 
husband or wife. " We have no secrets from 
one another. We know all that goes on in 
each other's mind and heart." But they do 
not, they cannot. There may not be any 
desire or intention to hide anything, one from 
the other. Yet a life is so large that no one 
can possibly understand it perfectly. We 
cannot know either all the good or all the evil 
in others. We cannot comprehend all the 
mystery there is in any friend's life. We 
cannot fathom the sorrow of our friend 
when the tears stream down his cheeks, or 
his joy when his heart is overflowing with 
gladness. 

These are suggestions of the incomplete- 
ness of human communion and fellowship. 
You and your friend come together in the 
most sacred intimacy possible, and yet he 
knows only a little of you. Your life and his 
touch at only a few points. 

[95] 



€^e iszauty of €Uty %>ay 

But when you enter into your inner cham- 
ber and shut the door upon you and God, 
you are in the presence of One who knows 
you perfectly. It was said of Jesus, " He 
knew what was in men." That is, he looked 
into the life of every one who came into his 
presence, and saw everything that was in 
it. He read the thoughts and feelings, he 
saw the insincerities, the hypocrisy, the in- 
trigue, the enmity of those who were plotting 
against him. He saw the heart hungers, the 
cravings, the shy love of those who wished for 
his friendship. He knew what was in every 
man and woman. When Jesus asked Peter, 
"Simon, lovest thou me?" the answer was, 
" Yes, Lord, thou knowest all things ; thou 
knowest that I love thee." He knew all. 

This brings us to the very heart of the 
meaning of prayer. You may not find great 
comfort in communion with even your best 
human friend, for he does not understand 
you. He sees too little of your life. But it 
is your Father who is in the inner chamber 
with you, and he knows all, understands all, 

[96] 



^ut %X)y ^oor 



and he loves you with a love that is infinite in 
its compassion and its grace. 

" Pray to thy Father." God seeks in every 
way to make his love plain to us, to show us 
how he wants to bless us. Of all the revela- 
tions he has made to us of himself, no one 
means quite so much as the name Father. 
We know something of fatherhood as we see 
it in imperfect men, in ourselves if we are 
fathers. A writer says : " I never can forget 
the hour when I first became a father. A new 
feeling swept through my soul and trans- 
formed all life and all the world for me. Then 
a moment later came a vision of God. God 
is my Father. My new-born love for my new- 
born child is a shadow at least, a revelation, 
of the love of God for me." It is your Father 
whom you meet in the inner chamber when 
you enter in and shut the door. No other 
answer is needed when some one asks you 
if you believe in prayer. Just say, " God is 
my Father, and of course I can pray to him." 
You cannot conceive of a true father to whom 
a child cannot come with his questions, his 

[97] 



Clje iseaut? of €be*? 5©ai? 

difficulties, his dangers, his sorrows, his sins. 
If God is your Father, there is nothing you 
cannot bring to him. 

Think, too, who God is. Earthly fathers 
are limited in their knowledge, in their vision, 
in their power to help. But God is without 
limitation. He is almighty. He is not little, 
like you. It is sweet to sit down beside a 
human friend who is rich in character, in 
sympathy, in wisdom, in love, in power to 
help, and to know that he is your friend. 
Some of us know by experience what it is to 
have such a person to whom we can go with 
our weaknesses, our hard questions, our 
inexperiences, and to know that all this 
friend is and all he has he will put at our 
disposal. But how little the strongest 
human friend has power to do for us ! He 
is only human like ourselves. 

Then think of the immeasurable greatness, 
power, wisdom, and love of this Father, with 
whom you come into communion in the inner 
chamber when you have shut the door. 
When Tennyson was once asked his thought 

[98] 



^ut %fyy 2E>oor 



about prayer, he answered, " It is the open- 
ing of the sluice-gate between God and my 
soul." Back of the sluice-gate is the great 
reservoir with its pent-up volumes of water. 
Below it are the fields and gardens to be irri- 
gated, the homes to be supplied with water. 
The opening of the sluice-gate lets the floods 
in to do their blessed work of renewal and 
refreshing. Prayer is the sluice-gate between 
God and your soul. You lift the gate when 
you pray to your Father, and infinite floods 
of divine goodness and blessing — of life 
— pour into your heart. 

Our thought of prayer is too often pitiably 
small, even paltry. Within our reach are 
vast tides of blessing, and we take only a 
taste. Many persons seek but the lower and 
lesser things in prayer, and lose altogether 
the far more glorious things that are possible 
to their quest. What did you ask for this 
morning when you entered into your inner 
chamber and shut your door upon your 
Father and you, and prayed? Did you ask 
for large things, or only for trifles? for all 

[99] 



C^e iseaut? of ttotvy &>ay 

the fulness of God, or only for bread and 
clothes and some earthly conveniences? for 
earth's tawdriness, or heaven's eternal things? 

" It is true prayer 

To seek the Giver more tlian gift; 
God's life to share, 

And love — for this our cry to lift." 

A writer defines religion as friendship with 
God. If this be a true definition, what then 
is prayer? When you visit your friend and 
are welcomed, and you sit together for an 
hour or for an evening, do you spend the 
time in making requests, asking favors of 
each other? Do you devote the hour to tell- 
ing your friend about your troubles, your 
hard work, your disappointments, your pinch- 
ing needs, and asking him to help you? 
Rather, if you have learned the true way to 
be a friend, you scarcely even refer to your 
worries, anxieties, and losses. You would 
spend the hour, rather, in sweet companion- 
ship, in communion together on subjects dear 
to you both? There might not be a single re- 
quest for help in all the hour you are to- 

[100] 



^ut €^2 l^oor 



gether. There might be moments of silence, 
too, when not a word would be spoken, and 
these might be the sweetest moments of all. 
Our prayer should be friendship's communion 
with God. It should not be all requests or 
cries for help. When we enter our inner 
chamber and shut the door and pray to our 
Father, it should be as when two friends sit 
together and commune in confidence and love. 
" When thou prayest, enter into thine inner 
chamber, and when thou hast shut thy door, 
pray to thy Father." But some one says, " It 
would be impossible, with the duties that are 
required of us, in our busy days to spend 
large portions of time in the inner chamber, 
even with God." There is a way to live in 
which in a sense we shall be always in our 
inner chamber, with the door shut, in com- 
munion with our Father. This must have 
been what St. Paul meant when he said, 
" Pray without ceasing." There never was 
a more strenuous Christian worker than St. 
Paul. He certainly was not on his knees 
" without ceasing." But we can learn to be in 

[101] 



€^e ^Beauty of €Uty &av 

our inner chamber with God through all our 
busiest days. That is, we can commune with 
him while we are at our work and literally 
shut our door to pray to our Father. Jesus 
prayed that way. His days were all days 
of prayer. He was in communion with his 
Father when he was working in his carpen- 
ter's shop, when he was teaching by the sea- 
side, when he was performing miracles of heal- 
ing in people's homes or upon the streets, 
when he was walking about the country. 
There really never was a moment when he 
was not in the inner chamber, with the door 
shut, praying to his Father. 

There is a sense in which we all should 
obey this word of Christ's in the same way. 
There is no other way in which many of us 
can obey it. We have our long hours when 
we must be at our common tasks. We want 
to give a portion of our time to religious 
duties, but here also Christian work presses, 
and we cannot pray long apart. There are 
duties which must be done in certain hours, 
even if we stay away from the meetings of 

[102] 



^ut C^t ?^oor 



worship. It is said of St. Francesca, that 
though she never wearied in her religious 
services, yet if during her prayers she was 
called away by some domestic duty, she would 
cheerfully close her book, saying that when 
a wife and mother was needed, she must quit 
her God at the altar, to find him in the duties 
of her home. There come times in every life 
when formal prayer is not the duty. Yet we 
may be really in communion with God while 
we are doing our plainest tasks. We must 
make all life prayer, in the inner chamber 
with God. 

Yet while this is true, this is not the only 
way to read the lesson. Jesus took a great 
many hours to be in the inner chamber, alone, 
with his Father. He spent whole nights with 
God. He would rise a great while before day 
and go out to the mountain to pray. His com- 
mand here should be literally obeyed by all 
his followers. We must get time for prayer. 
No other where can we get strength. The 
work we do without prayer is poor work, 
work without power. The busy day that does 

[103] 



€^e iszauty of ttotty %>ay 

not begin with prayer is a day without divine 
blessing. The sorrow that does not go to 
God remains uncomforted. The joy that is 
not sanctified by prayer is not perfect. The 
teacher who does not pray before teaching 
finds even the Bible without power to impress. 
The preacher who does not enter into his inner 
chamber and shut the door, with only God 
and himself within, may preach eloquently, 
but his preaching will not win souls, will not 
comfort sorrow, will not edify saints, will not 
lead men into holy service. 



[104] 



mtyat to i®o tott^ ^oubtg 



Let thy day be to thy night 

A letter of good tidings. Let thy praise 

Go up as birds go up, that when they wake 

Shake off the dew and soar. So take joy home, 

And make a place in thy great heart for her, 

And give her time to grow, and cherish her. 

Then will she come, and oft will sing to thee 

When thou art working in the furrows; ay, 

Or weeding in the sacred hour of dawn. 

It is a comely fashion to be glad — 

Joy is the grace we say to God. 

JEAN INGELOW. 



VIII 

ffifyat to %>o toiit) &tmbt$ 




E can scarcely think of John 
the Baptist as ever among 
the doubters. His faith 
seems invincible. He intro- 
duced Jesus to men as the 
Lamb of God. He was most courageous and 
strong in his witnessing. How can we explain 
the lapse of faith in him? 

No doubt the cause was partly physical. 
Our bodies have more to do than we dream 
with the tone of our spiritual life. John was 
a child of nature. He had been brought up 
in the wilderness, living in the open air. Now 
he was in a close, foul dungeon. The con- 
finement irked him and made him sick. No 
wonder he became depressed. 

Then John was disappointed in the trend 
and course of the Messiahship of Jesus. When 
he spoke so confidently a little while ago, pro- 
claiming that Jesus was the one who was to 

[107] 



C^e I3eaut? of ttety 3®ay 

come, he was thinking of a Messiah who should 
carry the axe and go out with fire and fan. 
The Messiah he was expecting was to be a 
great conqueror. Instead of this, what he 
heard in his prison was of a most gentle and 
kindly man, who was everybody's friend, who 
would not set his foot even upon a worm, who 
allowed himself to be wronged and never re- 
sented nor retaliated. " Can this really be 
the Messiah? " he began to ask. 

There probably was a personal element also 
in John's questioning. He had been the de- 
voted friend of Jesus. Now John was lying 
in a dungeon, wearing chains, suffering un- 
justly, and Jesus outside was enjoying great 
popularity, and seemed to have utterly for- 
gotten his old friend. Why did he not do 
something for John? Why did he not even 
come to see him in his prison, to give him 
cheer? " An Arctic explorer was once asked," 
says Dr. George Adam Smith, " whether, dur- 
ing the eight months of slow starvation which 
he and his comrades endured, they suffered 
much from the pangs of hunger. ' No,' he 

[108] 



Wi^at to ?g>o tofty ^oubtjs 

answered, ' we lost them in the sense of aban- 
donment, in the feeling that our countrymen 
had forgotten us and were not coming to our 
relief ! ' " May there not have been some feel- 
ing like this in John's mind? 

Some of us know how hard it is to pray and 
count on God's coming with help in some in- 
tolerable sorrow, and then not to have him 
come. From the old crusading days we have 
this pathetic story. A crusader returning 
from the Holy Land was seized by enemies 
and cast into prison. There he lay month 
after month, hoping that in some way relief 
might come to him. One day he heard the 
sounds of martial music, faint and far away, 
and his heart leaped with joy. The sounds 
came nearer and still nearer, and soon he 
caught the notes of old, familiar airs. Then, 
looking out through the grating of his cell 
window, he saw the flashing of spears. Closer 
the column came, and then, with wild emo- 
tion, he saw that it was a company of his own 
men, the same men with whom he had gone to 
the Holy Land. Right under his window they 

[109] 



C^e istauty of fttotty %>ay 

were passing — he saw their very faces and 
recognized them. He cried out to them, but 
the music drowned his cries, and they rode on 
and rode away, their banners passing out of 
sight, leaving him in hopelessness in his 
prison. 

So it seemed with John in his dungeon. 
News oi the beautiful things Jesus was doing 
outside came to his windows continually. He 
was working great miracles. " Will he not 
come this way? " the chafing lion in the dun- 
geon cried. " Will he not come and take me 
out of this terrible prison? " But the music 
died out on the air, and he came not. As we 
think of this, we can understand why John 
began to ask questions about Jesus. " Is he 
really the Messiah, as I used to believe he 
was ? " 

Are we patient enough with doubt like 
John's? Somehow the religious world has al- 
ways been most unforbearing toward any 
shadow of doubt, or even toward any ques- 
tions concerning beliefs which seemed to in- 
dicate the least uncertainty. There are 

[110] 



CSJ^at to ?E>o toitl) 5^oulitj8 

Christian men who are so impatient of even 
a child's mere request for light, as to drive the 
tender-hearted one, hungry for knowledge, 
back to the world, and almost to incurable 
skepticism. The Bible is the same in its 
teachings about God, age after age, but as 
men see more and more clearly its wonderful 
revealings, their opinions change, their views 
become truer. It is said that in the archives 
of an old church is preserved a manuscript 
sermon, preached by a clergyman who was 
pastor of the church for fifty years or more. 
At the bottom of the title page are the words, 
" All wrong," signed by the man who had 
preached the sermon. In thirty-three years 
the preacher's views upon the subject had 
undergone a radical change. 

Jesus was not fulfilling John's idea of his 
Messiahship, and John began to wonder 
whether he was really the Messiah or not. The 
trouble was that John's early views of the 
manner of the Messiahship were wrong. 
There was nothing wrong with the course of 
the Messiahship — it was only with John's 

[mi 



presuppositions concerning it. There are 
good people in these days whose opinions are 
different altogether from what they were in 
the past. There has been no change in the 
truth — only they understand it better now. 
There are people who, in circumstances of 
sorrow, almost begin to despair, because they 
think that God is not the loving Father they 
used to think he was. The trouble is, how- 
ever, that they did not at first truly under- 
stand his Fatherhood. They did not see how 
continued pain could be love, how it could be 
in love that he allowed the suffering to go on 
unrelieved. Jesus said, " What I do thou 
knowest not now; but thou shalt understand 
hereafter." We say that John had lost his 
faith; no, he did not yet understand the 
Messiahship of Jesus — that was all. 

It is instructive to notice what John did 
with the doubts which arose in his mind. He 
did not nurse them and brood over them. 
That is the last thing to do with any doubts 
or questions. Some people nurse their sus- 
picions of others until they have grown into 

[112] 



M^at to %>o t»it^ doubts 

utterly false beliefs concerning them. Some 
people nurse their jealousies until they be- 
come murderous thoughts and feelings. Some 
people nurse their misunderstandings of Christ 
and his way with them until they give up 
Christ altogether and say they cannot be- 
lieve on him nor follow him longer. 

The truest thing for you to do, if you have 
a friend who seems to have been unkind to 
you, is not to believe the things some whis- 
perer has told you, or your own interpreta- 
tion of the things you may think your friend 
has done; the only true thing to do is to go 
right to the friend with the matter which is 
troubling you. Then you will find, in ninety- 
nine cases in a hundred, that you have only 
misunderstood him. If to-day you are judg- 
ing another, feeling that he is not loyal to 
you, if he seems to have slighted you or failed 
in tenderness or kindness to you, almost surely 
you are misjudging him. Do not nurse your 
feeling, nor let it grow into doubt or suspi- 
cion. Do not allow it to influence your rela- 
tions with your friend, your treatment of him. 

[113] 



C^e TBeaut? of tUvy %>ay 

Keep on loving and believing in him. Go to 
him and talk it over with him, and you will 
find that you have only misunderstood him. 

What did Jesus say when the disciples of 
John came to him with their master's question? 
He did not blame John for his doubts. He 
did not say he was disloyal. He had no word 
of unkindly criticism. He did not treat John 
as if he had done something very wrong' in 
seeking for light on his question. Christians 
who are older and have had wider experience 
in life, need to practise the utmost gentleness 
in dealing with younger or less experienced 
Christians. David in his old age said it was 
God's gentleness that had made him great. 
If God had been harsh or ungentle with him 
in his sins and faults, David never would have 
been saved. It was said of Jesus that he was 
so gentle he would not even break a bruised 
reed, nor quench a dying spark in the lamp 
wick. He would so help to restore the reed 
that it would grow into strength again; he 
would so shield the dying spark that it would 
live and become a flame. If Christ had re- 

[114] 



CflO&at to %>o toity ^oubtg 

buked John for his questions, we cannot tell 
what the effect on the discouraged man in 
his dungeon would have been. 

The definite question which John sent to 
ask Jesus was, " Art thou he that cometh, or 
look we for another? " Jesus gave no direct 
answer. Instead, he asked the men to stay 
during the day and see what he was doing, 
and then go back and report to John. This 
would be the best answer to his questions. The 
things the men saw were the true evidences of 
the Messiahship of Jesus. What are the evi- 
dences of Christianity to-day? May we not 
give the same answer that Jesus gave that 
day to John's disciples? " The blind receive 
their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are 
cleansed, and the deaf hear, and the dead are 
raised up and the poor have good tidings 
preached to them." The work of love that 
is going on in the world is the greatest of all 
evidences of Christianity. The map of the 
world tells the story. The missionary map, 
with its patches of white and black, tells the 
story. Wherever the gospel goes, love 

[115] 



C^e I3eaut? of (Eiier? %>&v 

goes, and the things that love does are 
the evidences. Christianity has built every 
hospital in the world, every asylum for the 
insane, every institution of charity, every 
orphanage, every home for the aged, for 
the blind, for crippled children. These are 
the real evidences of Christianity. Every 
sweet home where love dwells, where Christ's 
name is dear, where prayer is offered, is an 
evidence. Every Christian mother, with her 
children about her, is an evidence. Some one 
says : " There is no human force for good or 
ill equal to the talk of women. They have 
listeners who have all power in heaven and on 
earth, for women chiefly are the ones who talk 
to God and to little children." Every Chris- 
tian home, with its teachings, its prayer, and 
its love, is a shining evidence that Christ is 
the Son of God. 

John was perplexed about the Messiahship 
of Jesus. It seemed to him that things were 
not going right with him, that he ought not 
to have been left in prison if Jesus were really 
the Messiah. He learned, however, that noth- 

[116] 



oa^at to %>o to(t^ doubts 

ing was really going wrong, that he was not 
being neglected. John's continued imprison- 
ment was not in vain. His blood was not shed 
in vain. The air of the world has been purer 
ever since. There is no mistake made when 
your prayers for relief from trouble seem not 
to be answered — they are answered, though 
the answer is not the taking away of the 
trouble, but grace that you may bear it. 

The way Jesus dealt with doubt is very 
interesting and suggestive. He was most 
patient with it. He pitied men's weaknesses. 
There are two kinds of doubting. One is 
skepticism, denial of the facts and truths 
about Christ and Christianity. The other is 
only inability to understand; merely ques- 
tioning to learn. That was the doubt the 
Baptist had ; that was the doubt Thomas had. 
Christ loves to have us come to him with our 
questions, our difficulties. 



[117] 



€#ng$ t^at $ in* We 



" He kept his soul unspotted 

As he went upon his way, 
And he tried to do some service 

For God's people day by day; 
He had time to cheer the doubter 

Who complained that hope was dead; 
He had time to help the cripple 

When the way teas rough ahead; 
He had time to guard the orphan, and one day, well 

satisfied 
With the talents God had given him, he closed his 
eyes and died" 



IX 



Clings ti&at 1$mt Life 




HE problem of Christian liv- 
ing is not to miss the strug- 
gle, suffering, or hardship, 
but to pass through life 
without being hurt by any of 
its experiences. One of the requirements of 
pure religion is " to keep one's self unspotted 
from the world." This does not mean that 
we are to keep ourselves out of the world's 
life, to flee away and hide in refuges and re- 
treats, where the evil of the world will not 
touch us, but to stay where our duty is, to 
meet life as it comes to us, to face the bat- 
tles with sin, the struggles and temptations 
which belong to our peculiar place, and yet 
not be hurt, not contract any stain, not carry 
away wounds and scars. 

In everything in life Jesus Christ is our 
highest example. He solved this problem of 
living for us. He met hard and painful ex- 

[121] 



C^e "htauty of €tozxy 2£ay 

periences, but never was harmed by any of 
them. He endured temptation, being tempted 
in all points like as we are, yet always with- 
out sin. He passed through the sorest test- 
ings that any one ever endured, but kept 
himself unspotted. He met enmity, growing 
out of envy, pride, selfishness ; men hated 
him, conspired against him, watched him, 
persecuted him, sought to kill him. 

The natural effect upon any man of such 
enmity, hatred, bitterness, and injustice is 
to make him grow suspicious, misanthropic, 
cold, resentful, revengeful. But Jesus was 
not affected in this way. He was beyond all 
such effects. He could not be insulted, — his 
nobility of character lifted him above the 
possibility of this. He was pained but not 
harmed by men's cruel words. He never 
became suspicious. His love never grew 
less gentle, less magnanimous, less kindly. 
Through all his three years of opposition, 
hatred, plotting, treachery, and wrong, he 
came with the heart of a little child. He 
passed on to the end unharmed in his own 

[122] 



C^ttQjS t^at ^utt tilt 

life. He was as patient, gentle, loving, and 
childlike the day he went to his cross, as he 
was the day the Spirit descended upon him 
like a dove. The little spring by the sea- 
side pours out its sweet waters through the 
salt sands. The tides roll over it and their 
brackish floods bury it for hours. Bat again 
it appears, and its waters are sweet and pure 
as ever. So it was with the heart of Jesus 
Christ. The world's enmity left no embit- 
tering in him. He loved men at the last 
as he had never loved them before. 

This is the problem for every Christian 
life. It is possible to pass through this 
world's sorest temptations and not to be in- 
jured by them. It is possible for us, how- 
ever, to be hurt, most sorely hurt, by such 
experiences. Sin always works injury. It 
is something one never altogether gets over. 
It may be forgiven — God loves to forgive 
unto the uttermost — but its marks and 
scars remain. When the bloom of the 
fruit has been touched, it never can be 
restored; when the rose has been crushed, 

[123] 



C^e I3eaiiti? of (Btotxy 3®ay 

it never can be made lovely again. So sin's 
hurt is irremediable. The secret we must 
learn is to pass through life with garments 
unsoiled. 

There are special ways in which we may 
be harmed by the experiences of life. Noth- 
ing is more common than sorrow. Into every 
life it comes at one time or another. It comes 
sometimes as bereavement, taking away one 
who is dear, whose continued existence seems 
necessary to our happiness. Again it comes 
as a grief that hangs no crape on the door, 
wears no weeds of mourning, and does not 
break into the outward show of happiness, 
but which stays as a secret sorrow, without 
human sympathy or comfort. We usually 
suppose that sorrow brings always a bless- 
ing, that it always helps those who endure 
it, enriching the life, sweetening it, making 
it more beautiful. But this is not in every 
case true. Sorrow often harms people's 
lives. It does not always sweeten — some- 
times it sours the spirit. It does not always 
soften — sometimes it hardens the heart. 

[124] 



Ctyngg t^at f urt Ltfe 

It does not always give peace and calmness 
— sometimes it makes one irritable, fretful, 
selfish, exacting. When we pass through sor- 
row, we need to be exceedingly careful lest 
we shall be hurt by it. We need the great 
Physician then — he only can heal wounded 
hearts so as to leave no scar. 

There is a story of an Indian child who 
one day brought in from the field a hurt 
bird. The old chief asked the child where she 
had found the bird. " Among the wheat," 
was the answer. " Take it back," he said, 
" and lay it down just where you found it. 
If you keep it, it will die, but if you give it 
back to God, he can make it well again." 
It is with hurt hearts as it is with hurt birds. 
They belong to God, and only he can heal 
them. Human hands are clumsy and un- 
skilful in comforting. If you have sorrow, 
let God be your heart's healer. No human 
hands can help, save those that God has 
trained into something of his own gentleness. 
When God comforts, there are no hurts re- 
maining in the life, he is so gentle, so skilful. 

[125] 



Another common experience in life is the 
wounding of love. Somebody does you a 
wrong, speaks unkindly of you, injures you 
in some way. It is natural for you to be 
angry, to say bitter words in return, to cher- 
ish resentful and unforgiving feelings against 
the person. You are in danger now of being 
hurt by the experience. The only safety in 
such a case lies in love — keeping love in 
your heart. Love says, " Forgive." Noth- 
ing else can save your life from being seri- 
ously hurt. If you grow resentful and bitter, 
and refuse to forgive, you have inflicted 
upon yourself an injury which never can be 
undone. 

The truth is that no one in the universe 
can really do actual harm to you but your- 
self. Others may treat you unjustly. They 
may take your hard-earned money from you 
and refuse to return it, may borrow and not 
repay. They may wrong you in some griev- 
ous way.* They may falsely accuse you, and 
thus dim the whiteness of your name. They 
may injure you in 3 r our body, break your 

[126] 



^inw t^at f uxt JLtfe 

bones, kill you, but in none of these wrongs 
or injuries can they really touch you, your- 
self — the being that lives within you. St. 
Paul speaks of the outward man suffering 
decay, while the inward man is renewed day 
by day. Enemies may tear your flesh in 
pieces, but they cannot harm you. You will 
emerge with a broken and torn body, but 
with the spirit of a little child, if you have 
kept yourself in love, in peace, in purity, 
through all the hard experiences. 

But if in meeting wrong you have let 
yourself grow bitter, if you have become 
angry, if you have allowed vindictiveness to 
enter your heart, if you have refused to for- 
give, do you not see that you have hurt your- 
self, have done grievous and irreparable harm 
to your own life? A man told the story of a 
great wrong which had been done to him by 
another, a wrong involving base treachery. 
It had been years before, but it was known 
that his noble life had been nobler ever since 
the wrong had been done, that he had been 
sweeter in spirit, that he had been richer in 

[127 ] 



C^e I3eaut? of €tony 3®ay 

helpfulness and service, and that he had been 
in every way a better man, a greater bless- 
ing to others. When asked how it came that 
that great tragedy had not hurt his life, 
had not made him bitter, he said that he had 
kept love in his heart through it all. That 
was the secret, and that is the only secret 
of coming through life's wrongs, injustices, 
cruelties, and keeping one's self unspotted 
from the world, unhurt by its want of love, 
by its cruelty. 

One wrote to a friend, telling how hard she 
had found it not to grow bitter toward a per- 
son who for years had made life very hard for 
her father. There is much injustice in the 
world. It is easy to grow bitter; yes, but 
think of the hurt the bitterness would bring 
upon your own life. Yet if you patiently 
endure the wrong and keep yourself un- 
spotted, your heart unhardened. the expe- 
rience has not made your life less beautiful. 
Get the blessing that is promised in the Beat- 
itude for those who are persecuted. 

Another of these perils in life comes from 
[128] 



C^tngg t^at f in* life 

care. Perhaps no other mood is more com- 
mon than worrying. Nearly everybody wor- 
ries. A score of reasons against anxiety 
could be given, but one of the most serious 
of all is the harm it does the life. It hurts 
it deeply and irreparably. It writes fear 
and fret on the face, and blots out the fresh- 
ness and the beauty. Worry makes you old 
before your time. It takes the zest out of 
your life. It quenches your joy. It makes 
all the world less bright for you. It de- 
stroys faith in God and robs you of the 
sweetness of your trust. It withers, wrinkles, 
and blotches your soul. You do not know 
how seriously and ruinously you are hurting 
your life, spoiling it, wasting its substance, 
destroying it, if you are letting care into 
your heart and allowing it to do its harmful 
work in your life. 

" Pure religion and undefiled before our 
God and Father is ... to keep one's self 
unspotted from the world." That is the 
problem of Christian life, — whatever the life 
may have of hardness, of wrong, of injustice, 

[129] 



Clje TStauty of tUvy ]®ay 

of struggle, of sorrow, — to keep the heart 
pure and sweet, at peace, filled with love 
through it all. The lesson is hard, you say. 
Yes, but not half so hard in the end as to 
have your life scarred, bruised, blotted, its 
possibilities of love atrophied, its gentleness 
petrified. There are people no more than 
middle-aged, who are incapable of any sweet 
joy, incapable of loving deeply, richly, ar- 
dently, incapable of enthusiasm in living and 
doing good, because they have become a prey 
to care, or have let themselves be hardened 
by bitter feelings. 

Life is too sacred, too holy, with too many 
possibilities of beauty and happiness to be so 
mistreated, so perverted, so irremediably in- 
jured. How, then, can we keep our hearts 
unspotted from the evil of the world? The 
lesson is particularly for the young. Per- 
haps the old never can now learn it well, — 
it is too late, — but the young can do it, 
if they begin now, living with Christ, in 
his love, in his joy, in his companionship, 
in his obedience. God can keep your life 

[130] 



Clings t^at i^urt life 

hidden in the secret of his presence. Sci- 
entists tell us of the charmed life of frail 
things. The tiny flower that grows on the 
mountain crag is safer than the mountain 
itself. It bends and yields and remains un- 
broken, unbruised, in the wildest storms. Its 
frailness is its strength and its security. How 
frail our lives are in comparison with the 
great mountains and the mighty rocks ! Yet 
we have a charmed existence. Our very weak- 
ness is our safety. 

The superintendent of a hospital in Mex- 
ico, a hospital chiefly for workers on a new 
railroad, writes of her amazement over the 
way some persons are brought in hurt from 
accidents, with scarcely a trace of life remain- 
ing, and yet how life persists in them. She 
tells of one man with both arms torn away at 
the shoulders, of both limbs broken in two or 
three places, head cut and torn, body bruised, 
yet living and recovering. How frail we are, 
and yet what persistent life we have! God 
loves us and will shelter us from harm and 
will keep us from being destroyed, if only 

[131] 



C^e I3eaut? of (Eber? &av 

we will let our lives lie in his hands, trusting 
and obeying him. " We prevail by yielding, 
we succumb to conquer, like those sea flowers 
which continue to bloom amid the surf, where 
the rocks crumble." We have seen flowers 
growing sweet and fresh in the early spring 
days under the great snowdrifts. So God 
hides and protects the gentle lives of those 
who trust in him, in the very snow banks of 
trouble and trial which surround them. The 
least and feeblest of us can keep ourselves 
unspotted in the sorest perils, if we hide away 
under the shelter of the divine love. 

The secret of coming through suffering 
and struggle unharmed is to learn that we 
must endure for the sake of others. It helps 
us to be strong when we know that others 
will be affected by our victory or defeat — 
helped when we endure nobly, harmed if we 
prove unfaithful. Some one writes : " We 
shall be glad, really glad of everything that 
has come to us, no matter if it be sorrow or 
pain, when we find that our experience fits 
some one's else need — that some one else 

[132] 



e^mgg t^at ^uvt lift 

can build on our lives." It makes us strong 
to be true and pure and noble and worthy 
when we know others will be influenced by 
the way we stand the test. We dare not fail 
when others are depending on us. 



[133] 



letting £toa? from €>ur pa$t 



Not what we have, hut what we use; 
Not what we see, but what we choose — 
These are the things that mar or bless 
The sum of human happiness. 

The things near by, not things afar; 
Not what we seem, but what we are — 
These are the things that make or break, 
That give the heart its joy or ache." 



X 

(Bettfttg atoa? from £>ur $agt 




T. PAUL tells us that he 
made his progress in spirit- 



ual life by forgetting the 
things that were behind. 
Remembering is a favorite 
Bible word. Forgetting is not usually com- 
mended. There is peril in forgetting. Indeed 
we forget altogether too much. Yet there are 
certain things we must forget if we would 
make any progress in life. We must forget 
our mistakes. There are many of them, too, 
and some of us never get away from their 
influence. We often sigh, " Oh, if I had not 
done that foolish thing, if I had not let that 
bad companionship into my life, if I had not 
taken that bad advice, how much better my 
life would have been ! " We fret over the 
mistakes we have made, the blunders of our 
lives, and yield to their disheartening in- 
fluence. We think that we can never make 

[137] 



Cije OBeautr of tbzty ^a? 

anything of our life because of one pitiful 
mistake, one grievous sin; that we can 
never be a soldier because we have lost one 
battle; that we can never succeed in busi- 
ness because our first effort was a sad 
failure. These are things we should forget, 
not allowing them to check our onward 
life. 

Some people carry the mistakes of all their 
years with them unto the end, and they hang 
like chains about them, so that they can 
make no progress. But this is a fearful 
waste of life. We grow by making mistakes. 
Think how many mistakes you made in learn- 
ing to write, how many copybooks you 
spoiled before your penmanship became a 
credit to you ! Think how many mistakes 
the artist makes before he is able to put a 
worthy picture on canvas, how many mis- 
takes the musician makes before he is 
able to play a piece of music well! In 
every department of life there are years 
and years with little but mistakes, imma- 
turities, blunders, while men and women 

[138] 



dotting atoay from ®uv $agt 

are preparing for beautiful living and 
noble work. Forget your mistakes, leave 
them behind, let God take care of them, 
and go on to better things. Build a palace 
on your failures, making them part of the 
foundation. 

We should forget the hurts we receive. 
Somebody did you harm last year. Some- 
body was unkind to you and left a wound. 
Forget these hurts. Do not remember them ; 
do not cherish them, allowing them to rankle 
in your heart. The other day a man's hand 
was swollen and black, in serious danger of 
blood poisoning, all from a little splinter 
which in some way got into a finger and was 
permitted to stay there until it almost made 
necessary the amputation of the hand or arm, 
endangering the life. That is the way little 
hurts, when remembered, fester and make 
great distress, and sometimes produce even 
fatal results. Remember how Cain's envy 
was nursed and grew into fratricide. Jesus 
warned men against anger, saying it is 
murder, that is, the beginning of murder, a 

[139] 



Ctye Beauty of €totty %>ay 

feeling which if cherished may ripen into 
actual crime. 

There are people who grow jealous of 
others. First it is only a feeling of which 
they are ashamed. But they brood over it, 
think of it day and night, until it grows and 
at length fills their whole life, and becomes 
a hateful passion which spoils their days and 
possibly ends in some great wrong. How 
much wiser is the oyster! A tiny grain of 
sand gets under its shell and grinds and 
hurts and makes a sore. Instead, however, 
of letting it become an ugly wound, the 
oyster, by peculiar secretions, makes a pearl. 
That is what we may do with others 5 unlov- 
ingness or their faults, — change them into 
pearls of beauty in our character. If any 
one hurts you by an unkindness, forget it 
and let the wound be healed in love. 

We should forget our past attainments, 
our successes and achievements. A writer 
tells of a man he had known for twenty-five 
years. The first time he saw him the man 
told of a certain good thing he had done 

[140] 



dotting &way ftom ®uv pa$t 

many years before, — a really good thing 
which greatly helped a community. He had 
seen him occasionally ever since, and every 
time the man told him the same story of the 
fine thing he had done long ago. It was a 
really good story. The thing he did was 
worthy. But would it not have been better 
if he had forgotten that one excellent deed of 
the long ago in doing other better things a 
hundred times since? We should never re- 
gard any noble deed of ours as our best. 
We should never look back for the climax of 
our attainment or achievement. St. Paul was 
quite an old man when he wrote the words 
about forgetting past things, but he had for- 
gotten all his past sacrifices and achieve- 
ments, and was looking forward yet for bet- 
ter and higher work to do. However noble 
and useful your last year was, however good 
you were, however much you did for Christ 
and for your fellow-men, forget it all and 
set about making the next year the best ever 
you have lived. 

We should forget our past sins. In one 
[141] 



C^e TSzmty of €tovv %>ay 

sense we cannot. They will not be forgotten. 
This ought to keep us humble and make us 
wary. We should never forget the peril of 
sin. But sin forgiven should be forgotten 
and left behind. That is, we should believe 
in the forgiveness of our sins which have 
been confessed and repented of. The other 
day one was speaking of an experience of 
over fifteen years back, — a sin, — and the 
black shadow still hung over his life, shutting 
out the sun and the blue of the sky, hiding 
the face of God and quenching all joy and 
hope. That is not the way Christ wants us 
to do with our sins. He came to save us 
from them, and when they are forgiven, he 
bids us go in peace. Put your repentance 
into songs of gratitude and j oy and into new 
service. If one day has been spoiled by sin, 
do not spoil another day by grieving over it. 
Forget your past sins in holy and beautiful 
living. 

We should forget our sorrows. It is not 
easy. The empty chairs remind us always 
of those who used to sit on them. The loneli- 

[142] 



letting £t*)a? from £>ut $agt 

ness stays, and it takes wise and diligent 
watchfulness not to allow a sadness to wrap 
itself about us like sackcloth, or to enter into 
us like an atmosphere and darken our life. 
But God does not want our sorrows to hurt 
us, so as to mar our joy and beauty. He 
wants them to become a blessing to us, to 
soften our hearts and enrich our character. 
He wants us always to remember the friends 
who have been so much to us and have gone 
from us, but to forget the griefs in the joy 
of divine comfort. A lost sorrow is one of 
earth's sorest losses. Every grief should 
leave a blessing. 

These are suggestions of St. Paul's secret 
of noble life, — forgetting things that are 
behind. We should never leave behind or 
throw away, however, anything that is good 
and lovely. We are to keep all our treasures 
of experience. All the good impressions, in- 
fluences, lessons, and inspirations that we re- 
ceive, we are to cherish. We should hold 
fast every good thing that comes to us. Not 
a good thing that is ever ours should we 

[143] 



C^e iszauty of cBfcett 1®ay 

lose. A writer says, " I desire no future that 
shall break the ties of the past." What a 
serious loss it would be if there were no re- 
membering, if we could not keep ever as our 
own the joys, the delights, the precious 
things of the past! We do not begin to 
know what treasures we may lay up for our- 
selves if we live always beautifully and have 
only sweet and sacred memories. " Make 
yourselves nests of pleasant thoughts," says 
Ruskin. " None of us yet know, for none of 
us have been taught in early youth, what 
fairy palaces we may build of beauti- 
ful thoughts, proof against all adversity, — 
bright fancies, satisfied memories, noble his- 
tories, faithful sayings, treasure-houses of 
precious and restful thoughts, which care 
cannot disturb, nor pain make gloomy, nor 
poverty take away from us — houses built 
without hands, for our souls to live in." 

We should keep all that will enrich our 
character, that will sweeten our memory, that 
will make music in our hearts in the after 
years, but things that will vex us and 

[144] 



(Betting atoa? from £>ur p>agt 

worry us as we think of them we are to 
forget. 

" Let us forget the things that vexed and tried us, 
The worrying things that caused our souls to fret ; 
The hopes that, cherished long, were still denied us 
Let us forget. 

" Let us forget the little slights that pained us, 

The greater wrongs that rankle sometimes yet; 
The pride with which some lofty one disdained us 
Let us forget. 

"Let us forget our brother's fault and failing, 
The yielding to temptations that beset, 
That he perchance, though grief be unavailing, 
Cannot forget. 

" But blessings manifold, past all deserving, 

Kind words and helpful deeds, a countless throng, 
The fault o'ercome, the rectitude unswerving, 
Let us remember long. 

" The sacrifice of love, the generous giving, 

When friends were few, the handclasp warm and 
strong, 
The fragrance of each life of holy living, 
Let us remember long. 

" Whatever things were good and true and gracious, 
Whate'er of right has triumphed over wrong, 
What love of God or man has rendered precious, 
Let us remember long." 

[145] 



C^e TBeautr of tbtxy l®ay 

We are to win the high altitudes in life by 
leaving and forgetting the things that are 
behind. Oh, if we could only get away from 
our past! It holds us in chains. It en- 
meshes us, so that we cannot get disentan- 
gled from it. " Remember Lot's wife," how 
the poor woman could not get free from her 
past, how it dragged her back when the an- 
gels were trying to rescue and save her, so 
that she was whelmed in the salt tide and 
perished. 

Many people are lost by clinging to their 
past. They have allowed it to be unworthy. 
When Cardinal Mazarin was near to death, 
it is said a courtier in his palace saw him 
walking about the great halls of his palace, 
gazing on the magnificent pictures, the stat- 
uary, and works of art. " Must I leave it 
all? Must I leave it all? " he was heard to 
murmur despairingly. These were his treas- 
ures, the accumulation of a long life of 
wealth and power. These were the things he 
had lived for, and they were things he 
could not take with him. He must leave 

[146] 



(letting atoay from €>w $a$t 

them to the moth and rust. We must 
beware of our earthly entanglements. We 
should forget the things of the past by 
having our hearts filled with the glory of 
things to come. 



[147] 



C^omas'g jtttetafee 



A wasted day! no song of praise 

Wells up from depths of grateful heart, 

Yet others long to hear our lays, 

The souls that dwell in gloom apart. 

A wasted day! no kindly deed; 

No cup of ivater, cool and siveet, 
We bear to other souls in need, 

Nor lead some pilgrim's straying feet. 

A wasted day! no victory won, 
The sicord lies idle in its sheath, 

If deeds of valor be undone, 

How can we wear the conqueror's wreath? 



XI 



t^omag'g jtttetafee 




HOMAS was not with the 
other apostles when Jesus 
appeared to them the even- 
ing of the Resurrection. 
Through his absence he 
missed the revealing of Jesus when he came 
that night and stood in the midst of the little 
company alive, and showed them his hands. 
The other apostles went out from the room 
with hearts full of joy. They had their 
Friend again. We have no record of what 
happened that week, but we are sure they were 
wondrously glad. A pastor tells of one who 
came to him with a great spiritual burden and 
whom he helped and led out into the light. 
The person said, " I have seemed to be walk- 
ing on air all the week." This must have been 
the experience of these apostles after Jesus 
had appeared to them that night. But think 
of Thomas all that week. He had missed see- 

[151] 



€^e I3eaut? of Cbeti? 2^a? 

ing the risen Jesus. His sorrow was uncom- 
forted. There were no songs in his heart. 

Do not many people have the same expe- 
rience? Have you thought what you may 
miss any time you are absent from a reli- 
gious service? There is a story of a col- 
ored man in the South who walked several 
miles to his church, and never failed to attend. 
One week he was noticed by a white neighbor 
trudging every evening through rain and 
slush to his meeting. " Why do you go so 
far to church these stormy nights? I should 
think you would stay at home when the 
weather is so bad." The old man took off his 
hat in the cold rain, and said with deep rev- 
erence, " You see, we are praying in our 
church for a blessing, and I would not dare 
to stay away for one night, for that might 
be the very night the blessing we are seeking 
would come, and if I were not there I should 
miss it." 

Church services are God's appointments. 
Christ asks his people to meet him. He al- 
ways keeps his appointments, and comes with 

[152] 



C^omajs'g $®imu 



a blessing. If we do not keep our appoint- 
ments with him, we shall miss the good, the 
cheer, the help we need, and which he came to 
bring to us. 

Thomas was not with the disciples when 
Jesus came. Those who came saw the risen 
Lord and received his benediction. A great 
joy came into their hearts. But Thomas 
missed all this blessing. We do not know what 
divine message may come to the worshippers 
in our accustomed place of worship any Sun- 
day morning. You may be in sorrow. The 
word that day may be a word of comfort, just 
the word your heart needs. Those who hear 
it thank God and go away with a song; but 
you, sitting in your home, nursing your grief, 
brooding over it, miss the message and go into 
another week unhelped, to walk all the days 
through gloom and shadow. 

You are a young person, discontented, un- 
happy, not knowing what to do with your life. 
You did not feel like going to church, so you 
were not there. That day the preacher spoke 
of life's meaning and purpose, — every life 

[153] 



€^e l$eautY of €Uty 3®ay 

a plan of God, — and showed with unusual 
plainness and clearness how to live so as to 
fulfil the divine plan for it. He answered 
the very question your heart was asking. But 
you were not at the service and you missed the 
lesson which might have changed the course 
of all your after life. 

You were greatly discouraged because of 
the hardness of the way. The week had been 
a difficult one, — things had gone wrong, you 
had not done well in business, there had 
been tangles and misunderstandings in your 
friendships. Saturday you were sick at heart. 
Sunday you were in gloomy mood and did 
not attend church. The service was an espe- 
cially uplifting one, telling of God's love, full 
of cheer, encouragement, and impulses to 
joy. If you had been present, you would 
have been greatly helped by the services, the 
prayers, the Scriptures, the hymns, the ser- 
mon — toward gladness and victoriousness ; 
you would have lost your discouragement in 
new spiritual courage, your weariness in 
magnificent enthusiasm. Others who were 

[154] 



C^omag'g jHtetafee 



present that morning carried away with them 
thoughts and inspirations which made all the 
week glad. But you, hiding away in your 
self-pity or your disheartenment, missed the 
message and the blessing, the kindling of hope 
and joy, and went into another week of 
weary struggle and toil unhelped. 

Thomas's mistake was that his gloom kept 
him from being present that night with the 
other apostles. Many people yield to dis- 
couragement, and discouragement hurts their 
lives. Discouragement is a sort of mental 
and spiritual malaria. It poisons the blood. 
Much of certain forms of sickness is only 
discouragement darkening the sky, putting 
out the stars, quenching all joy and hope. It 
was discouragement which kept Thomas 
away from the meeting with the apostles that 
night. We see how that mistake almost 
wrecked everything for him. If Jesus had 
not been so marvellously patient with his 
gloomy, doubting disciple, giving him a sec- 
ond chance a week later, Thomas would never 
have recovered himself and got back into the 

[155] 



C^e TStauty of Cfcer? J&ty 

apostolic family. But if he had been present 
at the meeting, he would have seen Jesus when 
the others did, and his discouragement would 
have been changed into faith, hope, and joy. 
We should lose no chance to see Christ. 
We should seek the places where he is most 
likely to come; we should be ready to hear 
every word that might reveal him. We should 
keep ourselves always in the light of the 
truth, in the shining of God's face. Christ is 
always coming to show us his hands with the 
print of the nails, to prove to us that God 
loves us. If we are always present when he 
comes, we shall never miss the blessing which 
he brings, and our lives will always be full of 
gladness. But the trouble with too many of 
us is that we are not present when he comes. 
He comes continually in manifold ways. He 
comes in every flower that blooms, in every 
blade of grass that waves in the breeze, in 
every bird that sings, in every beautiful thing 
that grows. He comes in the sweet love of 
your home, in the laugh of your little child, 
in the kindness of your friend. He comes in 

[156] 



C^omajs's jtttetafee 



all the blessings of the church, in the holy 
places of prayer. 

A good man said that the evening family 
worship had saved his home and its love. The 
days were full of little frictions and irrita- 
tions. He was a man of quick temper and 
hasty speech, and often was the home music 
jangled. The close of the day was unhappy. 
But the evening prayer set all things right 
again. The father and mother knelt, side by 
side, with their little children, and as they 
prayed, " Forgive us our debts, as we forgive 
our debtors," they were drawn close together 
again in love. The little strifes were healed, 
and their wedded joy was saved. The sun 
was not allowed to go down upon their dif- 
ferences. This is one of the blessings of fam- 
ily prayer. Christ comes and appears to us 
alive beside the sacred home altar and shows 
us his hands and speaks his word of peace. 

In every part of true home life Christ is 
always coming in little kindly, beautiful ways. 
In all pure friendships he comes continually 
with words and acts of cheer. Human kind- 

[157] 



C^e Beaut? of €Uty ?^a? 

ness is simply God revealing himself, Christ 
showing his hands. The world and all life 
are full of lovely things. In the darkest 
gorges among the mountains men find lovely 
little flowers blooming, which brighten the 
ruggedness ; so the tender things of divine 
grace make beautiful the most painful 
experiences. 

All this is meant to keep our lives cheerful. 
The joy is to dispel the sorrow. The sweet- 
ness is to overcome the bitterness^ Jesus 
comes in a thousand ways, with cheer and 
comfort, to make us brave and strong, to 
keep us from despair. But how often do we 
miss the beautiful things, the pleasure, the 
happiness, the comfort that God sends to us. 
We always find the thorns, but we do not 
always see the roses. We feel the pangs, the 
sufferings, but do not get the pleasure, the 
joy, the cheer. We miss seeing Jesus when 
he appears alive, shows his hands, and speaks 
his words of peace, but we always see the 
cross, the grave, the darkness. 

Shall we not learn the lesson which Thomas 
[158] 



C^omag's jmtgtafee 



had not learned and avoid making the mis- 
take he made? Life is full of opportunities 
of blessing, but too often we miss them. Shall 
we not learn to accept them every one? The 
room was chill and uncomfortable, for it was 
midwinter. Presently a beam of sunlight 
stole in through a crack in the shutter, and 
fell in a patch of brightness on the floor. 
The little dog had been lying in the cold and 
gloom. But the moment he saw a spot of 
sunshine on the carpet he got up and walked 
over to it and lay down in it. The dog 
teaches us a lesson. Wherever we see a spot 
of light in the darkness of our condition or 
circumstances, let us hasten to it and appro- 
priate it. Whenever we find a comfort or a 
pleasure, however it may have come to us, 
let us accept it. Whenever there is any 
beautiful thing along our path, it is for us, 
it was put there expressly for us ; let us take 
it into our heart and enjoy it as we go on our 
way. 

Let us miss no opportunity to be where 
Christ may be, to stand where he may pass 

[159] 



C^e iBeaut? of €Uvy &a% 

by, to go where he may come. The mistake 
of Thomas was that in his gloom and dis- 
couragement he was not in the company of 
the apostles that night. He lost the oppor- 
tunity of seeing the Lord living and of hav- 
ing his doubts and griefs swept away by the 
light of faith and love. Many of us con- 
tinually miss opportunities of gladness and 
beauty. We nurse our sorrows and turn not 
our faces toward the comforts of God. We 
stay in our little dark rooms with the shutters 
closed, and go not out into the blessed sun- 
light. We are not as happy Christians as we 
ought to be. We miss blessings we might 
enjoy. We live in the mists and fogs of the 
valley, when we might be dwelling on the clear 
mountain tops. We neglect opportunities of 
receiving divine revealings, and then say we 
cannot believe. Let us open our hearts to 
the beauty and grace of Christ, however it 
may come to us. Then we shall have no more 
doubts and fears, but shall find light and joy 
everywhere. 

[160] 



ffrtenng ana fittttfo&tfp 



/ shut my casement 'gainst the murky night. 
The morning dawned. The world ivas bathed in 
light. 

So, bent to shield my heart from pain and grief, 
I lost the joy that comes from pain's relief. 

EICHABD S. HOLMES. 



XII 



tfrtenttf and fivitnt&typ 




HE need of friendship is the 
deepest need of life. Every 
heart cries out for it. Jesus 
was the perfect Man, also 
divine, and he needed friends, 
craved friendship, and was disappointed when 
his friends failed him. Perhaps no shortcom- 
ing in good men and women is more common 
than the failure to be ideal friends. Too 
many follow their impulses only. To-day 
they are devoted in their friendship and in 
their expression of friendship; to-morrow 
something happens and they forget their 
ardor and abandon their friendship. 

There is no limit to the extent and devo- 
tion of true friendship. Peter thought if he 
would forgive seven wrongs and still keep on 
loving, he would do well. But Jesus said, — 
not seven times, but seventy times seven. The 

[163] 



C^e istmxty of ttevy %>ay 

love of a friend should never be worn out. 
" A friend loveth at all times. 55 

Many times, however, friendship balks and 
fails. So long as it is easy to do the things 
that need to be done, there is no wincing, no 
reluctance. You have only to entertain your 
friend, and he is genial and courteous. He 
never imposes on your kindness. He does not 
exact hard service, nor take your time need- 
lessly. He does not expect you to go out of 
your way to do things for him. Indeed, he is 
so thoughtful and pleasant that you are de- 
lighted to entertain him. But the case may be 
different. For instance, he is not a pleasant 
person to have with you. He expects a great 
deal of attention. The friendship becomes 
burdensome. What shall we do? Here is the 
test, — "A friend loveth at all times. 55 That 
is, your friendship does not fail when there is a 
call for large service, costly help, painful self- 
denial. Friendship requires us to turn aside 
from our own pursuits, if necessary, to oblige 
another who needs our service. The friend is 
willing to give up his own plans, drop his own 

[164] 



work, and at great inconvenience go with his 
friends to help them. This is the law of 
service. The friend who loveth at all times 
must be ready to do for his friend whatever 
the friend needs, perhaps whatever he de- 
mands, as far as it is in his power, not con- 
sidering the cost. If asked to go one mile, 
he goes two. 

The proverb reminds us also that a friend 
is " born for adversity." The very heart of 
friendship implies this. Friendship is not 
merely for times of trouble, — it is for bright 
days too. We need our friend's cheer in our 
happiest hours. "At all times" includes the 
sunny days. But it is for our days of adver- 
sity that our friend is born. Then it is that 
we need him most, and then it is that the rich- 
est and best of his love for us reveals itself. 
Adversity tests him. He may never have had 
an opportunity to do anything for you when 
all things were going well with you. There 
was no need in your life then to appeal to his 
sympathy. He was your friend, and shared 
with you the sweetness of his love, but the 

[165] 



Clje OBeautv of <&tevy 3®ay 

depths of his heart were not stirred. Then 
one day trouble came to you, — sickness, sor- 
row, loss, or danger, perhaps dishonor. In- 
stantly his love grew stronger. Its grip 
tightened. Its loyalty strengthened. The 
best that was in it came out. You never knew 
before that he loved you so much. All he had 
was yours, for whatever service he could ren- 
der to you. 

This is the test of friendship. Is it equal 
to the day of adversity? Does it shine out 
all the more brightly, the darker the night 
grows? Does your love become deeper, 
stronger, more ready for service and sacrifice, 
the greater your friend's need? It may be 
physical need, or it may be need of a mental 
or spiritual kind. Your friend may have 
fallen into temptation, and there is a shadow 
on his name. What should your friendship 
do then ? " A friend loveth at all times ; and 
a brother is born for adversity." 

" His lamps are we, 

To shine where he shall say, 
And lamps are not for sunny rooms, 
Nor for the light of day, 

[166] 



tfrien&g ant) jfrienD^tp 

But for the dark places of the earth, 

Where shame and wrong and crime have birth; 
Or for the murky twilight gray, 

Where wandering sheep have gone astray; 
Or where the light of faith grows dim, 

And souls are groping after him; 
And as sometimes a flame we find 

Clear shining through the night — 
So bright we do not see the lamp, 

But only see the light, 
So we may shine — his light the flame, 
That men may glorify his name." 

What are some of the ways in which friend- 
ship should reveal itself? It should not help 
unwisely; it should not overhelp. One of 
the truest words Emerson spoke concerning 
friendship is this, — "This is the office of a 
friend, to make us do what we can." At no 
point is there greater need for giving firm, 
urgent counsel to those who would be true 
friends than just here. In the warmth of 
your love you are apt to think that it never 
can be possible to be too kind. Yet true kind- 
ness is wise as well as tender. It must know 
how to restrain itself. You could do no 
greater harm to your friend than to teach 
him to be selfish, or to make him weak by an 

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C^e Beaut? of tUvy 2£a? 

excess of help to him when his burden is heavy. 
Your highest duty to him is to make him un- 
selfish. You are also to make him strong, 
self-reliant, and self-dependent. You are to 
bring out in him all the best and manliest 
qualities. This you never can do by coddling, 
petting, and babying. 

A distinguished botanist, exiled from his 
native country, found a position as under- 
gardener on a nobleman's estate. While he 
was there, his master received a rare plant 
with which no one on the estate was familiar. 
The head gardener, supposing it to be a trop- 
ical plant, put it in the hothouse to protect 
it from the winter's cold. He thought the 
plant needed warmth. It did not thrive, how- 
ever, — indeed, it began to droop. The new 
under-gardener, knowing the plant, its native 
place, and its nature, said : " This is an arctic 
plant. You are killing it by the tropical at- 
mosphere into which you have introduced it." 
He took the plant out into the frost, and to 
the amazement of the gardener piled ice about 
it. Soon it began to recover its freshness and 

[168] 



iffrfeuDg ana tfvittiDtifyip 

vigor, and its drooping life became vigorous 
and strong. It was being killed by summer 
heat when what it needed was the cold of 
winter. 

Friendship makes the same mistake with 
many lives. It coddles them, indulges them, 
treats them softly, with over-kindness. It 
tries to make all things easy for them, in- 
stead of making strong, brave men of them. 
This is a mistake that is made by many par- 
ents in dealing with their children. They 
try to save them from all hardness, from self- 
denial, from work and struggle. They bring 
them up in hothouses, not knowing that they 
are arctic plants, and need the snow and ice 
about them instead of the warm air of the 
conservatory. 

One finds the same mistake made sometimes 
in the way young wives try to bring up their 
husbands. They pamper them and coddle 
them, instead of helping to make stalwart men 

of them. Too manv wives do not think of the 

«/ 

higher moral good of their husbands. " And 
often a man who starts with a great many 

[169] 



C^e Beaut? of &Uty ^a? 

lofty and disinterested aspirations, deteri- 
orates year by year in a deplorable manner 
under the influence of a sufficiently well- 
meaning and personally conscientious wife." 
A young wife will prove her husband's best 
friend by trying to make him do his best, do 
what he can, become a man of heroic mould, 
a self-denying man. Every true wife wants 
her husband to take an honored place among 
men, to become a useful, influential man in his 
community, and to do something, in however 
lowly way, to make one spot of the earth 
brighter, better, more wholesome. The only 
way she can be that sort of a friend to him is 
to be his inspirer, findkig the best in him, and 
calling it out. This she can never do by pam- 
pering and by holding him back from hard 
work, from heroic struggle, from noble sacri- 
fice. She is his best friend when she makes 
him do what he can. 

The lesson applies to all friendships. If 
you are a friend who loves at all times, you 
will seek always to be an inspiration to every 
one in whom you are interested. You will 

[170] 



tfrfenDg ana fivimbtyiy 

ever be an encourager, never a discourager. 
That is the kind of Friend Christ is to all. 
He is ever calling us to something better, 
nobler, worthier, and truer. He does not tell 
us we are worms of the dust, as some of our 
hymns make us say we are, — he tells us we 
are children of God, heirs of glory, immortal 
beings, and calls us to live worthily. We 
should be such friends to men that we shall 
ever be striving to make them do what they 
can. 

The culture of friendship is most impor- 
tant. No friendship begins perfect. At first 
it is very imperfect. It is like the sculptor's 
block of unhewn marbte. The angel is in the 
block, but it has yet to be dug out and pol- 
ished into perfect beauty. No truest friend- 
ship which men admire ever has reached its 
perfect attainment easily, without struggle, 
without self-repression and much painful dis- 
cipline. We all start with a large measure 
of selfishness in our nature, and this must be 
mastered, extinguished, for no selfish man can 
be a worthy friend. 

[171] 



C^e beauty of €tety 1®ay 

We must practise the Beatitudes, — humil- 
ity, meekness, hunger for righteousness, mer- 
cifulness, purity of heart, the peace-making 
spirit. We must practise the Thirteenth of 
First Corinthians. A student in the Academy 
may master all the principles of art, but until 
he has practised art and acquired the tech- 
nique and is able to put his beautiful concep- 
tions on the canvas, he is not an artist. A 
music student may study the principles of 
music till he knows them all, but until he has 
learned to sing or play, he is not a musician. 
So one may know all the maxims and rules of 
friendship, but if he has not practised being a 
friend, he is not yet a friend, and may fail 
in some of the most important qualities of 
friendship, — patience, kindness, gentleness, 
thoughtfulness. 

The matter of expression is also important. 
It is important in music. It is important 
in speech. It is important in friendship. 
Many people love, but they do not show their 
love in delicate and fitting ways. Many 
homes are loving in a sense, but lack the fine 

[172] 



and gentle expression of love which would 
transform them into places of almost heav- 
enly happiness. A writer says : " When we 
look on this life from the heights of the heav- 
enly world, we shall marvel that the dearest 
friends who would have died for one another, 
if need be, should consent to give each other 
so much pain with their little unkindnesses. 
How strange it will all seem then that we were 
so exacting in matters so unimportant; that 
we were so careless of the sensitive places in 
a fond heart and touched them so roughly; 
that we were so ready to answer an impatient 
word with a more impatient one; that we 
were so forgetful of the little ministries of 
love that are worth so much more when un- 
solicited." 

Nothing in this world is more important 
than learning to live the friendly life. It is 
the highest reach in Christian living. The 
young people who are going together these 
days, talking about friendship, beginning to 
taste of its sweetness and dream of its rich- 
ness, should learn well what friendship means. 

[173] 



C^e iseautr of (fcbzxy ?^ay 

" A friend loveth at all times " — suffers 
long and is kind, envies not, does not act un- 
becomingly, is not provoked, seeks not his 
own, is patient, trusts, serves to the utter- 
most. We all need friends, but we must put 
first being a friend, and in this our hearts 
will be marvellously fed with friendship's best 
bread. In blessing others we shall be blessed 
ourselves. 

We must not forget that the only friend- 
ship which will fully meet any of life's deep- 
est needs is friendship with Christ. You 
may have all the joy and help of the sweetest 
human friendships, but if you have not 
Christ's friendship, you still lack that which 
is essential, that without which you never can 
know perfect peace. Thomas a Kempis says, 
" Love him and keep him for thy Friend, 
who, when all go away, will not forsake thee, 
or suffer thee to perish at the last." 



[174] 



C^e PoU and tije ^c^ool 



Just a little every day, 

That 's the way ! 
Children learn to read and write 
Bit by bit and mite by mite; 

Never any one, I say, 
Leaps to knowledge and its power; 
Slowly — sloicly — hour by hour, 

That 's the way I 

Just a little every day. 



XIII 




VERY heart longs for rest 
and seeks it. The world 
cannot give it. It is not 
found in the paths of pleas- 
ure; pleasure's flowers have 
thorns among them. It is not found in 
honor's rewards ; men chase fame, but when 
they seek to clasp it, it is only a bubble which 
bursts in their hands. It brings no rest. 
Money is one of the coveted prizes in this 
world. If only they can gather and amass 
money, they will be happy, men think. Money 
will supply all their wants. It will build pal- 
aces and fill them with the splendors of art. 
It will gather from all lands the luxuries that 
will load their tables and leave nothing to be 
desired by the daintiest appetites. Money 
seems to be able to meet all human needs. But 
there are some things which money cannot 
supply. It cannot give rest to the human 

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C^e beauty of €fce*i? ?Dat 

soul, cannot quiet the conscience and impart 
peace to a heart. Nothing earthly can. 
Then Jesus says to the whole race of men, 
to all weary ones, " Come unto me, and I will 
give you rest." Then he says again, " Take 
my yoke upon you, and learn of me; . . . 
and ye shall find rest unto your souls." It 
is important that we understand just how 
this prize of peace can be got. 

First of all, we must come to Christ. 
There he stands, looking with love and com- 
passion upon the whole world, with its needs, 
its sorrows, and its sin, inviting all to come 
to him. He is the Friend of friends. He is 
not a tyrant, to make gain of men; he comes 
to help them, to comfort them in their sor- 
rows, to enrich them in all noble ways, to lead 
them into the best possibilities of character. 

To come to Christ means to accept him as 
our Friend, to come into companionship with 
him, to take all the good he would give. We 
know what it is to come to a friend. We 
trust him, we love him, we give ourselves to 
him. A young girl hears the invitation and 

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C^e ^ofee and tyz ^c^ool 

wooing of love, and she comes to the man 
who offers her his affection, believes in him, 
confides in him, entrusts the happiness of her 
life to him, and becomes his. This is like 
what it is to come to Christ. This is the first 
thing in becoming a Christian. 

The next thing is to take Christ's yoke 
upon us. Yoke is not an attractive word. 
In the olden days it meant subjection. A 
captive nation came under the yoke of the 
nation conquering it. Christ speaks to those 
who come to him as taking his yoke upon 
them. This means voluntary acceptance of 
Christ as Master. He never compels us to 
become his, to be his friends, to do his will. 
We must take our place willingly with him. 
He has no slaves among his followers. They 
must offer themselves freely. 

Jesus says that his yoke is easy. We do 
not usually think of any yoke as easy. Sub- 
mission to any one is not to our mind. We 
like to be our own master. We do not like 
to be anybody's slave. Yet the yoke of 
Christ, he says, is easy. He means, for one 

[179] 



C^e idzauty of Ctoeri? %>ay 

thing, that he does not lay any unnecessary 
burden upon those who take his yoke. He 
is not a cruel master. He does not exact 
more than is right. He is very patient with 
our weakness. He sympathizes with our in- 
firmities. He knows how frail we are; he 
remembers that we are dust. His command- 
ment is not grievous. 

The weight or comfort of a yoke depends 
much upon our feeling toward the master we 
serve. It irks you and makes you chafe to 
serve one you dislike, but love makes any 
yoke easy. An old man, used to working with 
oxen, told the minister he could have helped 
him with his sermon. Then he said : " Jesus 
meant that his yoke fits well. It is made to 
suit the neck, so as not to hurt it." A badlv 
fitting shoe hurts the foot. A yoke which is 
rough or badly shaped is not easy, — it 
chafes. An easy yoke is one that suits the 
neck, that causes no friction. The yoke of 
Christ is easy because it suits the soul. It 
is natural to accept it and wear it. Sin is 
not natural. It means missing the mark* 

[180] 



Sin is failure. It is violation of law. Obe- 
dience is natural; disobedience hurts, jars, 
breaks the harmony, interrupts the peace. 
The yoke of Christ, as God made it, fits the 
soul. Hence it is easy, brings happiness, 
gives peace to the conscience. " The soul 
of man was made for God and never finds 
rest until it rests in God." We talk about 
God as the home of the soul. We never are 
really at home until we accept God's will; 
but when we do this, we soon begin to find 
joy, peace, and comfort in it. There is no 
truly happy life but the Christian's. The 
reason some Christians do not appear happy 
is because they do not really take the yoke 
of Christ. They do not love to obey. They 
do not completely give themselves up to 
Christ. They do not absolutely trust their 
lives, their affairs, to him. If we truly take 
Christ's yoke upon us, we shall find it a yoke 
of love and it will give rest to our souls. 

Then we are to enter Christ's school. 
" Learn of me," is the word. We begin as 
little children in the lowest grades. The cur- 

[181] 



C^e Tdzauty of Ctoery J®ty 

riculum of this school includes the whole line 
of study, from the merest beginnings until 
we reach perfection. Christian life is not 
something we attain in fulness at once, that 
we finish in a single act. At first it is only a 
decision, a choice, a determination. We then 
have everything to learn. We enter the 
school at the lowest grade. For example, 
the whole of Christian duty is love. Love is 
the fulfilling of the law. Jesus said we 
should be known to the world by our love one 
to another. Because our natures are jangled 
and perverted by sin, we are naturally self- 
ish, envious, jealous, unforgiving, uncharit- 
able. It is not natural for us, with our evil 
hearts, to be kind to those who are unkind 
to us, to return good for evil, to love our 
enemies, to pray for those who persecute us. 
Therefore the whole wonderful lesson of love 
has to be learned. And we will not master 
it in a day — it will take all our life. 

There is something very interesting in 
thinking of life as a school. There will come 
to you to-morrow a sharp temptation. When 

[182] 



God permits it, he does not mean that you 
shall be overcome by it, that you shall sin. 
Neither does he want to make life hard with 
struggle for you — he wants you to learn to 
meet and endure temptation victoriously. He 
wants you to become strong, and you can be 
made strong only by exercise. One cannot 
become a brave and skilful soldier by study- 
ing drill books — he must enter the battle. 
Jesus himself learned to be victorious in 
temptation by experience. Every tempta- 
tion is a lesson set for you; it is an oppor- 
tunity to grow. It is a part of the school 
of life. 

A new duty comes to your hand, some- 
thing you have never had to do before, — 
a new task, a new responsibility. God is 
setting you a new lesson. The first baby 
came the other day to the home of two young 
people. They are very happy, but happiness 
is not all. They have a new lesson set for 
them now, one they never have had before, — 
fatherhood, motherhood. The Christian vir- 
tues are lessons set for us to learn. They 

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Ctye I3eaut? of tUxy 3®ay 

are not put into our hearts full grown, when 
we first become Christians ; we have to learn 
them as lessons. St. Paul said he had learned 
contentment, and he seems to have been a 
good many years at it. In the same way we 
all have to learn patience; patience does not 
come natural to any of us. So meekness is 
a lesson to be learned. To be meek is to be 
gentle, mild of temper, self-controlled, not 
easily provoked, overcoming evil with good. 
Browning has it — 

He feels he has a fist, then folds his arms 
Crosswise, and makes up his mind to be meek. 

We have to learn meekness, and it takes 
most of us a long while. Forgiveness is a 
lesson. We are taught to pray, " Forgive 
us our debts, as we forgive our debtors." 
Perhaps some of us have been conning the 
lesson for many years and have not yet got 
it well learned. We have to learn unselfish- 
ness. Probably this is one of the hardest 
lessons in our whole course. Selfishness is 
ingrained in the very fibre of our nature. 

[184] 



C^e pofit and t^e ^c^ool 

We know how it persists, how it keeps com- 
ing up again and again at every point, no 
matter how you think you have it vanquished. 
It is very hard to forget self in our contacts 
with others, to honor the other person, to 
take cheerfully for ourself the second place, 
to deny ourself, that the other person may 
have the better portion. Unselfishness is a 
very long and hard lesson, and one of the 
latest of Christian life's lessons to be mas- 
tered, but it is one we must learn if we are 
ever to be a beautiful Christian. 

The same is true of all the sweet details of 
love. We are to be kindly affectioned. We 
are to be thoughtful and gracious. We are 
to love people that are disagreeable. That 
is, we are to be gentle to them, patient with 
them. We are to serve them if they need our 
service, to relieve them if they are in distress. 
We are to be kind to those who are unkind 
to us. We are to go miles to do some gentle 
deed to one who has treated us ungently. 
These are all lessons in Christ's school. 

u I never can learn these lessons," says 
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C^e iseautt of €tety ?®ay 

one. " If that is required in being a Chris- 
tian, I must give it all up. I never can cease 
to be jealous; I never can be kind to one I 
despise; I never can pray for one who does 
me an injury; I never can return good for 
evil." Not to-day perhaps, but perfection 
cannot be reached at once; it is the attain- 
ment of all one's years. We have to begin 
with little more at first than a desire to be 
kind, gentle, patient, a desire growing into 
a decision. You are a Christian the moment 
you really begin to learn, but a Christian 
only in the lowest forms. Then you are to 
continue in the school, learning every day, 
until at last you are graduated and receive 
your diploma and your degree. 

There is comfort in the form of the Mas- 
ter's words. His life is our lesson-book. 
" Learn of me," he says. Every lesson was 
perfectly learned and practised by him, in 
his own actual experience. Patience, humil- 
ity, meekness, gentleness, kindness, unself- 
ishness — he learned them all, learned them 
just as we have to learn them. They did 

[186] 



C^e ^ofee ana t^e ^c^ool 

not come to him in a miraculous way. Being 
with him, living with him, we shall see every 
lesson mastered and perfectly lived out in his 
life. 

Then " Learn of me " means also that 
Christ himself is our great Teacher. And he 
is a wonderfully patient Teacher. He never 
chides us for our slowness and dulness in 
learning. Nor is that all — he helps us with 
our lessons. Other teachers can do little 
more than set the lessons for us, and then 
encourage and inspire us, but our great 
Teacher can do more. He can give us skill 
and will even help us, will do the work for us 
or with us, when the lesson is hard. One tells 
of an artist's pupil who tried his best to 
paint his picture, but could not do it well. 
After trying hard he grew discouraged and 
weary, and then sank to sleep beside his easel. 
While he slept the master came, and seeing 
the boy sleeping, and knowing he had done 
his best and was disheartened, he took the 
brush from his limp hand and completed the 
picture for him in most beautiful way. That 

[187] 



C^e "Btauty of €Uty 2£a? 

is the way our Teacher does with us. When 
we have done our best, he takes our poor 
picture and finishes it for us. 

Let no one ever be discouraged in the 
school of Christ. Let no one ever say he can- 
not learn the great and hard lessons of Chris- 
tian life. We never can, — alone. We can- 
not even make one hair of our head black or 
white ourself. We cannot give up our jeal- 
ousy, our envy, our bitterness, our selfish- 
ness, and put sweetness, generosity, kindness, 
and love in their place, — we cannot alone. 
But Christ and we can, and that is the lesson. 

We are told that love, joy, peace, long- 
suffering, gentleness, goodness — the very 
things it is said we must learn as lessons — 
are the fruit of the Holy Spirit. That is, 
the Holy Spirit alone can produce these 
graces in us. You cannot make yourself lov- 
ing — it is the Spirit's work in you. Let the 
Spirit into your heart, give him charge of 
your life, and he will produce all these new 
and beautiful graces in you. 

We have seen also that the first thing in 
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C^e poU ana t^e ^c^ool 

becoming a Christian is to come to Christ. 
We come into his companionship, we live 
together, henceforth, — our Lord and we. 
Being with a lovely human friend transforms 
our life, makes it like our friend's life. Being 
with Christ will transform us into his beauty. 
Let no one then say it is impossible for him 
to become a Christian, to learn the things that 
Christ wants us to learn. In Christ you can 
do all things. Enter Christ's school, there- 
fore, join his classes, and let him teach you, 
help you, transform your life, and then you 
will grow into his loveliness. Then you can 
learn the lessons. 



[189] 



C^e meafe prot^ejc 



If any word of mine has caused one tear 

From other eyes to flow; 
If I have caused one shadow to appear 

On any face 7 know; 
If out one thoughtless word of mine has stung 

Some loving heart to-day; 
Or if the word I 've left unsaid has wrung 

A single sigh, I pray 
Thou tender heart of Love, forgive the sin. 

Help me to keep in mind 
That if at last I would thy " well done " win, 

In word as well as deed I must be kind! 



XIV 




T. PAUL had a good deal 
to say about the weak 
brother. The substance of 
his teaching is that those 
who are strong ought to be 
careful not to harm him who is weak in any 
way. They should be willing for his sake to 
make sacrifices of personal rights and privi- 
leges. We must modify and adjust our own 
life to bring it down to the level of the weak 
brother. We may not ignore him in the as- 
serting of our own liberty. The great ship 
in the channel may not go ploughing on its 
way with no regard for the smaller ships 
pursuing their course in the same channel. 
The great man in pursuing his course must 
think of the little men that are in his way. 
We may not live for ourselves alone. If you 
are one in a company of men travelling to- 
gether, and are strong and swift-footed, you 

[193] 



C^e I3eaut? of (fcUvy ?^at? 

may not set the pace for the party; you 
must hold your strength in restraint and ac- 
commodate your speed to the weak and slow- 
stepping members. The strong must help 
the weak, must be gentle toward them, patient 
with them. 

A little story poem tells of a race. A num- 
ber of runners were on the course. There 
was one who at first seemed destined to out- 
strip all the others. The way was long, and 
the goal far away. Still the favorite kept 
in the lead. But those who were watching 
the race saw this man stop by and by to lift 
up a little child that had fallen in the way 
and take it out of danger. A little later, 
a comrade fainted and he turned aside to 
help him. A woman appeared, frail and in- 
experienced, and he lingered to help her find 
the way. The watchers saw the favorite 
again and again leave his race to comfort, 
cheer, or help those who were in distress or 
peril. Meanwhile he lost his lead, and others 
passed him; and when the winners reached 
the goal he was far behind. He did not re- 

[194] 



Ctye oaeafe QBtot^er 



ceive the prize for the race, but the real 
honor was his. Love had ruled his course, 
and the blessing of many helped by him was 
his. The only true monument any one can 
have is built of love. John Vance Cheney 
writes in " The Century " : 

If so men's memories not thy monument be, 

Thou shalt have none. Warm hearts, and not cold 

stone, 
Must mark thy grave, or thou shalt lie unknown. 
Marbles keep not themselves; how then keep thee? 

There are men of ambition who harden 
their hearts against every appeal of human 
weakness, frailty, or suffering. They pay 
no heed to the needs that come before their 
eyes. They never turn away from their 
strenuous course to help a brother. They 
run their business on lines of strict justice, 
perhaps, but justice untempered by love or 
mercy. They demand always their pound 
of flesh. They put no kindness into their 
dealings. They pay small wages and exact 
the utmost of toil and service. They never 
turn aside to help a fainting one. They tell 

[195] 



C^e iszamy of €\*ny %>ay 

you there is no place for sentiment in busi- 
ness. They reach their goal — they become 
rich and great, but they have crushed the 
weak under their feet. There are other men 
who turn aside continually to help the feeble 
and the fainting, to be a comfort to the weak. 
They may not get along so well in the com- 
petition for power, money, or fame, but no 
weak brother perishes through their ambi- 
tion; no sufferer is left unhelped because 
they have not time to answer his cries. They 
leave no wreckage of little boats behind them 
in the water as they move on their course. 

There are a great many weak brothers in 
the world. There are those who are physi- 
cally weak. Some are lame. Some have 
feeble health. Some suffer from the infir- 
mities of age. What is the duty of the 
strong to the weak? Should they hold them- 
selves aloof and refuse to accept any burden, 
care, interest, or sympathy? A strong man 
may say, " I cannot take time from my busi- 
ness to do anything for this weak brother." 
But is not the strong man strong for the very 

[196] 



€^e ©3eafe OB totter 



purpose of helping the brother who is weak? 
The mountains in their majesty and strength 
minister to the plains below, to every little 
valley, to every flower and blade of grass, to 
every beast and bird. " The Alps were not 
uplifted merely to be gazed at and admired by 
pleasure-seeking tourists, but to feed the 
Rhine, and to nourish the teeming cities on 
its banks." But God does not give certain 
men strength and position, fine personality 
and great influence, merely that they may 
stand up high among their fellows, towering 
above them, to be admired and honored. 
They have their strength and their abilities 
that they may be a blessing to those who are 
less highly favored. 

In almost every community there is one who 
is intellectually weak, a foolish boy or man, 
or a girl or woman who lacks ability to take 
her place among her sisters. Sometimes such 
a person is made the sport of neighbors, of 
those who are bright and talented, laughed 
at, even treated rudely, cruelly. It is a piti- 
able sight to see one who is feeble-minded, 

[197] 



Ctye TBtauty of €iony 3®ay 

who has not wit enough to take his place 
among others. It is pathetic to see one buf- 
feted and abused by those to whom God has 
given good mental abilities. It is beautiful 
to see a bright, manly boy become the cham- 
pion and friend of another boy who is almost 
imbecile, protecting him from the sport of 
others. It is told of Edward Eggleston that 
in his boyhood he and his companions were 
forming a literary society. The membership 
they determined should include only the best 
boys and young men of the place. None who 
were undesirable should be admitted. There 
was one boy in the neighborhood who was 
mentally deficient, who greatly desired to 
join the society, that he might learn to 
" speak pieces," he said. Most of the boys 
laughed at the suggestion that he should be 
admitted. But young Eggleston, with a 
manly earnestness, favored receiving him. 
" We have no right," he said, " to keep all 
our good things to ourselves. This poor boy 
will do us no harm, and it will please him and 
it may do him good." He pleaded for the boy 

[198] 



C^e meafe 'htotyzx 



so earnestly that he was admitted. It made 
him very happy, and he became fairly bright. 
This was a Christly thing to do. Jesus 
would have treated the boy just as Edward 
Eggleston did. He never broke even a 
bruised reed, so loving was he toward the 
weak. We should seek to get the lesson into 
all our conduct. If there is a bashful girl in 
the neighborhood, or a shy, retiring boy, 
these are the ones to whom Jesus would have 
the young people show the greatest attention 
in their social life. Those for whom most 
persons do not care are the ones for whom 
Jesus would care the most tenderly if he were 
here. Those who need the most help are the 
ones Jesus himself helps the most. 

"All honor to him who wins the prize! " 
The world has cried for a hundred years; 
But to him who tries and fails and dies, 
I give great glory and honor and tears. 

Some people are weak in their character. 
The Master was infinitely patient with those 
who stumbled and fell. On his ears, as he 
stood in the place of trial, wearing the crown 

[199] 



€^e I3eautt of ttotty 2Dat 

of thorns, fell the words of bitter denial from 
the lips of his chief disciple, and they must 
have pierced his heart like thorns. But he 
spoke not one condemning word. He only 
looked toward Peter with grief, not with 
anger, winning him back to loyalty. Then 
when he returned from the grave, he sent his 
first message to Peter, — " Tell the disciples 
and Peter that I am risen." A little later 
he appeared to Peter first of the apostles. 
With wonderful love he surrounded this sin- 
ning, fallen disciple, that he might save him. 
Think what would have been the result if 
Jesus had not been thus loving and patient 
with Peter in those terrible hours. Peter 
never would have been restored. Think what 
a loss it would have been to the church in all 
ages if he had perished. 

We think we are strong, that we cannot 
fall, and so we condemn those who stumble. 
But we do not know that we are really strong. 
We dare not say we could not fall. When 
another Christian falls, it becomes us to be 
most watchful over ourselves, lest we also be 

[200] 



c^e aneafe isvotytt 



tempted. We do not know how a harsh or 
severe word may imperil the weak brother 
who has slipped or stumbled. If we treat 
him in a severe and condemning way, we may 
cause him to perish. We must be as Christ 
to him. Let the Master find genuine love in 
us. It is well to tell him of the love of Christ 
for him, of Christ's patience, gentleness, and 
compassion, but if he does not find these qual- 
ities of love in our treatment of him, what 
we have told him about them will make small 
impression upon him. 

Some men claim they have a right to drink 
moderately, and that it does not hurt them. 
St. Paul would say to these men : " Very well ; 
I grant all you say, at least for the sake of 
argument. You are strong and are never 
going to come under the power of appetite. 
You have liberty to have your wine on your 
table every day. Yes, but what about the 
weak brother who is influenced by your ex- 
ample, yet who has not your strength and 
cannot withstand the temptation of appetite, 
as you think you can do? What about him? 

[201 ] 



C^e I3eaut? of €tety 39ay 

6 Through thy knowledge he that is weak 
perisheth, the brother for whose sake Christ 
died.' " 

Some men say: "I cannot care for my 
weak brother. I cannot like him. I cannot 
have any patience with him. He is narrow 
and bigoted and has so many scruples that 
there is no getting along with him. Or he is 
not bright and I cannot enjoy being with him 
or doing anything for him. Or he is rude 
and low in his tastes. I cannot be the weak 
brother's friend." 

" For whose sake Christ died," seems to 
answer all these difficulties. Since Christ 
loved the weak brother enough to die for him, 
I ought to love him enough to be kind to him, 
to be his friend, to do him good, at least not 
to cause him to perish. This is a tremendous 
motive. The fact that Jesus died for the 
weak brother suggests his worth in the sight 
of God. There is a story of a woman who 
made her house a home for crippled and dis- 
eased children. Among those gathered under 
her care was a boy of three who was a piti- 

[ 202 ] 



C^e flUeafe i3rot^er 



able object. He was covered with blotches. 
The good woman could not love him, he was 
so repulsive, although she was always kind 
to him. One day she was sitting on the 
veranda with this boy in her arms. The sun 
was warm and in the perfume of the honey- 
suckles she slept. She dreamt of herself as 
having changed places with the child and as 
lying there, only more repulsive in her sin- 
fulness than he was in his physical condition. 
And over her the Lord Jesus was bending 
and looking into her eyes with longing, say- 
ing to her, " If I can bear with you who are 
so full of sin, and love you in spite of it all, 
can you not for my sake love this innocent 
child who is suffering not for his own sin but 
for the sin of his parents ? " 

She awoke with a sudden start, and looked 
into the boy's face. He had waked, too, and 
was looking intently at her. The passion of 
love came into her heart, and in her new emo- 
tion she bent down and kissed him as tenderly 
as ever she had kissed child of her own. The 
boy gave her a smile, so sweet she had never 

[203] 



Ctye istauty of cBfoer? 2^a? 

seen one like it before. From that moment a 
wonderful change came over the child. Love 
had transformed him from peevishness and 
fretfulness into gentle quiet and beauty. 

This is the vision we have in St. Paul's 
words, — " The weak brother perisheth for 
whom Christ died, — perisheth through thy 
strength, thy goodness." He is weak and 
perishes for want of your love, he for whom 
Christ died. How the picture startles us ! 
Surely we cannot think unkindly, harshly, or 
neglectfully any more of the weak brother 
when we remember that the Son of God gave 
himself to redeem him. There are lives all 
about us which seem to have lost their beauty 
and their splendor. They appear dull and 
lustreless. Yet in them sleep glorious possi- 
bilities. They need only the touch of love to 
bring out in them the divine loveliness. 

They are all about us, — these weak 
brothers. They have not our strength. They 
are unable to stand in the front rank to do 
great things. They are weak in their dis- 
position, — full of scruples, not easy to get 

[204] 



C^e COeafe TBroti&et; 



along with. They are weak in their charac- 
ter, — easily tempted, falling back readily 
into the old, bad ways. They are weak in 
their business life, never getting on. We 
need more and more to become helpers of the 
weak, whatever the form of their weakness 
may be. We ought, with our disciplined 
power, to be a home, a shelter, a refuge, for 
all weak or weary ones who come under our 
influence. Let them find love in us, for they 
have never found it in any one else. Let the 
weakest find love in us, though no otherwhere 
have they had any welcome. The sweetest 
and the strongest should be the gentlest. Let 
us go slower because the weak brother can- 
not go fast. Do not get vexed with the weak 
brother's scruples or unreasonable ways. Be 
sure that no weak brother shall ever perish 
through your superior strength and knowl- 
edge. Remember always that Christ died for 
the weak brother. 



[205] 



C^e Hurt of ti&e piinimv 



For me — to have made one soul 
The better for my birth; 
To have added but one flower 

To the garden of the earth; 

To have struck one blow for truth, 
In the daily fight with lies; 
To have done one deed of right 
In the face of calumnies; 

To have sown in the souls of men 
One thought that will not die — - 
To have been a link in the chain of life, 
Shall be immortality/" 



XV 



€^e JLure of t^e ffiini$tvv 




VERY worthy human occu- 
pation has its glory. Not 
every man should be a law- 
yer, not every one a physi- 
cian, a teacher, a journalist, 
a statesman, or a minister ; some should be car- 
penters, some shoemakers, some stone masons, 
some painters, — to each one his own work. 
Every one who does his duty after the will of 
God, in whatever calling, is pleasing God. 
Every man should find zest and joy in his 
work, should think of it as noble and worthy, 
and should put his best life into it. In speak- 
ing of the attraction of the ministry, we must 
remember that in every calling, even the low- 
liest, there is room for beautiful life, for hal- 
lowed service, for great influence. 

Somehow there is an impression in many 
quarters that the ministry is not an attrac- 

[209] 



€^e T&twty of €Uty 3^a? 

tive calling. The number of young men who 
choose it for their life work is small and seems 
to be growing smaller every year. Half a 
century ago many Christian fathers and 
mothers hoped that one or more of their boys 
would become ministers. Many a mother 
gave her first-born son to God with intense 
longing and much prayer that he might some 
day preach the gospel. Over his cradle she 
breathed this prayer continually. Perhaps 
the mothers do not now so much desire that 
their boys should become preachers. The 
attractions of the ministry do not win 
people's hearts as they did formerly. In- 
deed, there are many Christian parents who 
even seek to dissuade their sons from choosing 
this calling. It does not offer much in the 
way of money — other callings offer more. 
The commercial and financial world holds up 
its attractions and allurements. The other 
professions present opportunities for more 
brilliant careers. A lawyer may become a 
great jurist, a great statesman, or even may 
reach the presidency. The physician may 

[210] 



C^e lure of t^e piinimv 

attain high rank among men, may become 
celebrated all over the world for his skill in 
his profession. Over against all these attrac- 
tions the minister's life seems to suffer in 
winningness. The minister is not likely to 
become rich. It is said the average salary 
for ministers in this country is from seven to 
eight hundred dollars a year. This means 
ofttimes plain and close living, even pinching. 
It means also, in many cases, obscurity, with 
little chance for fame. Then the ministry 
has its hardships, its self-denial, and sacrifice. 

But in spite of these conditions the min- 
istry has its attractions which should draw 
resistlessly upon the hearts of worthy men. 
The minister is an ambassador of Christ. 
" We are ambassadors therefore," says St. 
Paul, " on behalf of Christ, as though God 
were entreating by us." The minister brings 
to men the good news of the love of God, and 
calls them to accept that love. Can there be 
any earthly honor so high, any calling so 
sacred as this? 

The minister himself is a representative of 
[211] 



C^e isZMty of ttevy %>ay 

Christ in the saving of the world. We know 
something of what Christ did for the com- 
munity in which he lived, for the homes into 
which he was received, for the individuals into 
whose lives he came. What he was to the 
community, to privileged households, and to 
the people who enjoyed his personal friend- 
ship, that the minister of Christ is to-day to 
the households and to the men and women to 
whom he ministers. 

Dr. John Watson (Ian Maclaren) in one 
of his lectures to theological students speaks 
thus of his own boyhood pastor : " People 
turned to him as by instinct in their joys and 
sorrows; men consulted him in the crises of 
life, and as they lay a-dying committed their 
wives and children to his care. He was a 
head to every widow, a father to the orphans, 
and the friend of all lowly, discouraged, un- 
successful souls. Ten miles away people did 
not know his name, but his own congregation 
regarded no other, and in the Lord's presence 
it was well known and was often mentioned. 
When he laid down his trust, and arrived on 

[212] 



C^e lure of ti&e pLinimv 

the other side, many whom he had fed and 
guided and restored and comforted, till he 
saw them through the gates, were waiting to 
receive their shepherd-minister, and as they 
stood round him before the Lord, he, of all 
men, could say without shame, ' Behold, Lord, 
thine under-shepherd, and the flock thou didst 
give me. 5 " 

This picture is not overdrawn, although 
perhaps not many pastors in the rush and 
hurry of these strenuous days get into such 
close and tender relations with their people. 
This, however, is the ideal relation, and in 
many parishes, both in city and country, min- 
isters do indeed become all this and more to 
their flocks. Old and young love them. The 
people welcome them to their homes. In times 
of joy they come, and their presence is not 
a restraint to gladness, but an inspiration. 
In times of sorrow they come, and their pres- 
ence, their sympathy, their love, and their 
prayers bring Christ himself near, and even 
seem to bring heaven down into the sad home, 
with its benedictions of joy. When the baby 

[213] 



C^e TStauty of €Uty 3®ay 

is born, when birthdays are marked, when 
the girl becomes engaged, when the wedding 
is celebrated, when the boy is graduated or 
takes an honor, when the silver and the 
golden anniversaries of the old people are 
observed, when sickness comes and all walk 
softly in the house, when death comes, and 
crape is on the door, and the funeral service 
is held, the pastor is there, — the friend, the 
sharer of joy, the giver of loving greetings 
and congratulations, the sympathizer, the 
comforter, — in his own lesser human way, 
just what Jesus was in the homes of the 
people in Galilee and Judaea the true minister 
is to his people in all the experiences of their 
lives. 

We are thinking of the attractions of the 
ministry, that in it which should draw young 
men into it, should lead them to choose it as 
a calling in which to find the deepest joy and 
the widest opportunities for service and help- 
fulness. Is it not something worth while, 
something worthy of the noble life, to come 
into such relations with people? 

[214] 



C^e JLute of ti&e jftinim? 

Perhaps we do not appreciate the sacred- 
ness of this part of the minister's life and 
work. He is the confidential friend of thou- 
sands of people who come to him with their 
anxieties, their perplexities, their questions, 
their disappointments, their failures, their 
fears and doubts, their sorrows and their sins. 
His study is a confessional. Protestants do 
not require the confession of people in their 
churches, and yet there are times in the life 
of every one of us when we need to go volun- 
tarily to a trusted pastor and tell him the 
burden that is on our hearts. To many per- 
sons this is one of the most sacred privileges 
of life. Ofttimes hope would die if it were 
not possible to find some one to whom to 
speak, to find human sympathy and wise 
counsel in days when the burden is too heavy 
to be borne alone, or the way cannot be found 
without a guide. Even the strongest people 
need sometimes a friend who will stand by 
them, who will be gentle, patient, and for- 
bearing with them when they have stumbled 
and sinned. Thousands go down when they 

[215] 



C^e iszmty of thzxy j®9$ 

have failed because no love comes and no 
hand is reached up to help them to start 
again. 

Ofttimes people need advice. They do not 
know what to do or where to go. In such 
times a wise, sympathetic pastor may save a 
life from doubt, a soul from despair. People 
are inexperienced. They lack wisdom. They 
are dazed and confused by their circum- 
stances, and need a friend who understands 
life better than they do. It is not material 
help they require, — it is guidance, inspira- 
tion, direction, encouragement. Two persons 
have fallen apart through some misunder- 
standing. A wise, gentle, and tactful pastor 
can bring them together and make their lives 
one again. A man has some trouble in his 
business, and his minister cheers him and 
makes him brave to overcome his discourage- 
ment and go on to success. One falls into a 
bad habit which is sapping his life and ruin- 
ing his career. The minister comes, not with 
reproof, but with love and grief and strong 
help, and saves him. One fails and falls and 

[216] 



€^e lure ot ttye jtttmgtti? 

is almost in despair, and the minister is like 
Christ to lift him up, to save him. 

These are mere glimpses of some phases of 
the personal work of the minister, the part 
of his work the world knows nothing about. 
He is priest as well as pastor. In one of St. 
Paul's epistles, where he is speaking of the 
strenuousness of his own work, he says this: 
" Besides those things that are without, there 
is much that presseth upon me daily, anxiety 
for all the churches." If any one is in trouble, 
he is troubled too. If any have sinned, he is 
grieved, almost to heart breaking. If any 
are suffering, he suffers too. " Who is weak, 
and I am not weak? who is caused to 
stumble, and I burn not?" The minister's 
heart-burdens are his heaviest. People do 
not begin to know how their minister enters 
into their experiences, their sicknesses, their 
struggles, their sorrows, their temptations 
and falls, as well as their joys. When their 
home is shrouded in gloom, his heart is 
breaking. 

Is there nothing in this part of the min- 
[217] 



ister's calling to make it sacred and holy? 
There is higher honor in being such a friend 
to men and women, in entering into the inner 
experiences of their lives, and in standing as 
priest between them and God, than there can 
be in the most distinguished position the world 
can give to any man. 

The work of a minister is sacred also be- 
cause of its essential motive. It is all a ser- 
vice of love. The lawyer does not need to 
love his clients. The physician may not love 
his patients. The teacher may teach without 
personal affection for his pupils. But the 
minister must love his people, or his work will 
avail nothing. Though he speak with the 
tongues of men and angels, if he does not love, 
his eloquence is but sounding brass. St. 
Paul's epistles are full of love. You feel the 
heart-beat in every chapter. For example, 
" We are gentle in the midst of you, as when 
a nurse cherisheth her own children : even so, 
being affectionately desirous of you, we were 
well pleased to impart unto you, not the 
gospel of God only, but also our own souls, 

[218] 



C^e tun of t^e ffltntmv 

because ye were become very dear to us." 
There is no true ministry without love. 

The name minister means servant. He is 
his people's servant for Jesus' sake. The 
people of a true pastor do not begin to know 
how deeply and fully he lives for them, how 
devotedly he serves them, how tenderly he 
loves them. He never wearies of doing for 
them. There is a story of St. John, the be- 
loved disciple, which illustrates the minister's 
love for his people. A noble youth was once 
committed to him by his parents. St. John 
was obliged to go away on a long journey, 
and left his ward in the care of others. When 
he returned, he was told that the youth had 
fallen into evil ways and had joined a band 
of robbers and had become their leader. St. 
John was filled with grief and self-reproach. 
He hastened to the stronghold of the robbers' 
band, seized the young man by the hand, 
kissed it, and calling him by his familiar 
name, brought him back home again to his 
old faith. Thus does the true minister love 
souls and seek to save them. 

[219] 



€^e TStauty of €tety 5^ar 

The minister is also a man of prayer, a 
man of mighty intercession. The ancient 
high priest carried the names of the twelve 
tribes on the twelve stones on his breastplate ; 
the minister carries the names of his people 
in his heart. He prays for them, not as a 
congregation only, but as individuals, one by 
one. His church roll is his rosary. He is 
the personal friend of every member of his 
flock. He is the lifter-up of those who faint 
or fall. He is an encourager, a strengthener. 
In all the world there is no opportunity for 
such service of others as the ministry affords. 

No true-hearted young man seeks for ease, 
for self-indulgence, whatever his calling. 
There is nothing noble in such a life. 
Worthy men want an opportunity to give 
their life for men, as their Master did. They 
want an opportunity to be the friend of 
others, to do them good, to lead them upward. 
This is the highest life possible. They will 
find scope for such life in the ministry. 



[220] 



ISarroto *Lfoe$ 



" / saw him across the dingy street, 

A little old cobbler, lame, with a hump, 

Yet his whistle came to me clear and sweet 

As he stitched away at a dancing pump. 

" Well, some of us limp while others dance; 

There's none of life's pleasures without alloy. 
Let us thank heaven, then, for the chance 
To whistle while mending the shoes of joy." 



XVI 




OME people seem to live 
narrow lives. Their circum- 
stances are narrow. They 
are hemmed in, as it were, 
and it appears to them they 
never can make anything of themselves. In 
their little, circumscribed environment they 
dream of a larger world outside, with its 
beauty, its opportunities, its privileges, its 
achievements, and they wish they could climb 
out of their close, cramped place and enjoy 
the wider world, the freer air, the larger 
room for living, outside. And some young 
people fret in the limitations in which they 
find themselves. 

But we should never chafe, — chafing 
spoils our lives. It is ingratitude to God. 
We should accept our circumstances in life, 
our condition, our providential environment, 
with love and trust, in the spirit of content- 

[223] 



C^e 'Beaut? of <BUty %>ay 

ment. We are not, however, indolently to 
accept our limitations, as if God wants us 
to stay there forever, and make no effort to 
get into larger conditions. Usually we are 
to be led out of them at length into a larger 
place if we do our part and are faithful. 
Contentment with our lot is a religious duty, 
and yet we are never to fret about our small 
chance, not trying to better our condition, 
and blame God for it, complaining that if we 
had had the larger opportunity which some- 
body else had, we would have made something 
worth while of our life. 

God does not want us to be contented with 
insignificance if we are able to hew our way 
out to better things. Ofttimes narrowness 
of this kind is really a splendid opportunity 
rather than an invincible hindrance. God 
puts us into a small place at the beginning 
that in the very narrowness we may get im- 
pulse and inspiration for larger things, and 
in the effort and struggle grow strong. A 
young medical student was speaking of the 
hampered early beginnings, — poverty, neces- 

[224] 



$at*ot» JLffoeg 



sity for hard work, and more struggle to 
get an education. A friend said : " Do 
you know that these very experiences were 
God's way of blessing you? He gave you 
the narrow circumstances that you might 
make the effort to grow. If you had had 
money, easy conditions, and affluent circum- 
stances, you never would have been where 
you are to-day, — about to enter an honored 
profession." 

In one of the Psalms there is a word which 
tells not only the writer's own life story, but 
that also of countless others. He says, " He 
brought me forth also into a large place." 
He is referring to troubles and dangers which 
had encompassed him, shut him in, made 
what seemed an invincible siege about him. 
But the Lord delivered him from his strong 
enemy and brought him out into a large 
place. Many people have had similar de- 
liverances. We remember times when there 
appeared to be only disaster and calamity 
for us, and trouble, shutting us in, entan- 
gling us in the wilderness, with no hope of 

[2*5] 



€^e 'Btauty of ttotvy %>ay 

escape, when God, in some way we had not 
dreamed of, brought us out into a place of 
safety, of joy, of peace, of enlargement, of 
prosperity. 

But in still gileater way David's word 
was true of his life. He had been brought 
up in lowly circumstances, but the Lord led 
him out into a large place, making him king 
of a great nation, and giving him opportu- 
nities for wide usefulness. The same was true 
of Joseph. Through thirteen years of what 
seemed adversity and calamity, God brought 
him to honor, power, and great success. 
Nearly all who have reached noble character 
and great usefulness have been led forth from 
limiting circumstances into a large place by 
a divine hand. 

Some people, however, permit themselves 
to be dwarfed in their hampering conditions. 
They allow the narrowness of their circum- 
stances to get into their souls, and every 
noble aspiration is smothered, the wings of 
hope are cut, the fires of enthusiasm are 
quenched. There are stories of men who 

[226] 



$arrot» JLtoeg 



have been buried alive, sometimes built into 
granite walls. So these people allow them- 
selves to be buried alive, in their narrow 
circumstances. Far more people than we 
know make this mistake. They have not 
wealth with its luxuries to give them a soft 
nest. They have not influential friends to 
open doors for them, to lift them into places 
of comfort and favor, to give them opportu- 
nities for a great career. So they conclude 
that their lives are doomed to littleness 
and failure. But really, if they only knew 
it, what they consider disadvantages are 
meant for advantages. What they regard 
as hopeless handicaps are meant to be wings 
on which they may rise. The narrowness 
which makes some people despair, is really 
a condition full of great possibilities. It 
needs only courage and persistence to turn 
it into a blessing. One writes : 

Misfortune met two travellers, and swelled to twice 

his size; 
One, cowering, groaned, "Alas, this hour! " and fell, 

no more to rise. 



[227] 



C^e istmty of Ctoeri? &av 

The other climbed the ugly shape, saying, " It 's well 

you came! " 
And made Misfortune serve him as a stepping-stone 

to fame. 



Look at Christ's own life. We know how 
narrow it was in its early conditions. He 
was brought up in a peasant village, without 
opportunities for education, for social im- 
provement, for training for life. When we 
think of the bare circumstances in which Je- 
sus grew up, we wonder how his life devel- 
oped into such beauty, such nobleness, such 
marvellous strength. 

The secret was in himself. The grace of 
God was in him. At the end he said, " I 
have overcome the world." He always lived 
victoriously. His circumstances were nar- 
row, but no narrowness from without could 
cramp or dwarf or stunt his glorious spirit. 
The narrowness never entered his soul. His 
spirit was as free in the hardest days of his 
earthly life as it was in heaven's glory be- 
fore he came to the earth. He found in the 
Nazareth home, with all its limitations, room 

[ 228 ] 



^arroto Libeg 



enough in which to grow into the most glo- 
rious manhood the world has ever known. We 
need not say that it was the divine within 
him that enabled him to triumph over hin- 
drances and disregard limitations. He met 
human life j ust as we all must meet it. Temp- 
tation and struggle were as real to him as 
they are to us. He showed us how we may 
overcome the world. 

Whatever our conditions may be, however 
bare, hard, and invincible they may seem to 
be, Christ can enable us to live in them just 
as he lived in his barer, harder conditions, 
and to come out at length into a wider place. 
We are not clay, dust. We have in us an 
immortal life which ought to be unconquer- 
able. We should laugh at our limited con- 
ditions ; they cannot bind or limit us. Some 
one, or perhaps it was a bird or a squirrel, 
dropped an acorn in the crevice of a great 
rock. It sank down and was imprisoned in 
the heart of the stone. But moisture from 
heaven's clouds reached it, and it grew. It 
must die in its dark prison, you would have 

[229] 



€^e TBeaut? of <&tety &>ay 

said. No; it grew and burst the mighty 
rock asunder and became a great oak tree. 
So we should grow in the severest conditions, 
and then we shall come out into a wide place. 
Truth is mighty. It may not manifest it- 
self in a strenuous life. It may be quiet, 
making no noise, and yet it has all the power 
of God in it. A noble girl was engaged to 
a young man who was in business with his 
father — the brewing business, although 
they did not say much about this, — with fine 
prospects of wealth and prosperity. When 
the girl learned the fact, she talked it over 
with the young man and then told him very 
frankly that she could not marry him unless 
he abandoned the business in which he was 
engaged. She said that she was a Christian, 
and believing that the business was wrong, 
she could not be the wife of a man who was 
engaged in it. She could not live in a home 
which the business maintained. She could 
have no blessing in it. The young man was 
astounded. He saw nothing wrong in the 
business. His father was honorable. Yet 

[230] 



jftatrotD JLifceg 



he loved the girl, listened to what she said, 
and considered seriously the possibility of 
doing what she asked. After much thought 
he became satisfied that she was right, and 
decided to give up his place in the business 
— for his father was immovable. He went 
to the bottom of the ladder and began life 
anew. His friends talked of the unreason- 
ableness of the girl in demanding such sacri- 
fice, and of the young man's folly in accept- 
ing her guidance. They called it bigotry 
and intolerance. 

But the narrowness was really in the cir- 
cumstances in which he was already bound 
in his father's business. He was held a pris- 
oner there. Christ now led him out into a 
larger place. His manliness developed into 
splendor of character. It took half a dozen 
years of hard work, severe struggle, and 
pinching economy, but he came out at length a 
man of strength. If he had remained in his 
old environment, he would have been only a 
rich brewer, unrecognized among men, unhon- 
ored, even cut off from men of noble rank. 

[231] 



C^e istauty of €Uxy l®ay 

But in this new free life he became a power 
among his fellows, a moral force in the com- 
munity, building up a home which became a 
centre of beauty, happiness, and good. He 
was accustomed to say afterward, " My 
wife's principles made a man of me." Here 
was indeed the gentle hand of Christ, sent 
to lead him out of his narrow prison into a 
wide place. 

Sin stunts life wherever it touches it. 
Selfishness cramps and dwarfs. Envy and 
jealousy bind the soul in a wretched environ- 
ment. Love enlarges the tent. A Christian 
woman tells of the kind of friend she used to 
be. SKe would choose a girl friend and 
would love her intensely. But she was so 
insanely jealous of her that the girl must be 
her friend and hers only. If she called on 
another, or walked with another, or even 
spoke kindly to another, her friend's anger 
knew no bounds. There was no happiness in 
such friendship for either of the two. It was 
a miserable prison in which the woman her- 
self was bound, and her passionate friend- 

[232] 



$areoto Libeg 



ship made only bondage for the one she 
loved. 

Then the woman tells of giving her heart 
to Christ, and learning from him the secret 
of true friendship. The old jealousies had 
vanished. When she had a friend, she was 
kind and loving to her, and wanted everybody 
to love her. God had led her forth into a 
large place. She had a thousand times the 
joy she used to have in the old-time narrow, 
exacting, suspicious friendship. She had en- 
larged the place of her tent. It was no 
longer a little place for our thin canvas 
walls, with room only for herself and one; 
it widened out until it was as wide as the 
love of Christ. 

We cannot let Christ into our hearts with- 
out becoming broader in feeling, larger in 
interest, wider in hope, more generous in all 
ways. We have no right to be narrow. We 
should pray to be delivered from all narrow- 
ness in our friendships, — in our heart life, 
our church life, our neighborhood life, our 
school life, our social life. Look at Christ 

[233] 



C^e QBeaut? of tiazvy %>ay 

himself as the perfect One. He enlarged the 
place of his tent until it became as wide as 
the blue sky. Under its shelter all the weary, 
the lonely, the homesick, the suffering, and 
the sorrowing take refuge. 



[ 234 ] 



€^e €tue Enlarging of JLtfe 



Soul that canst soar! 
Body may slumber; 
Body shall cumber 
Soul-flight no more. 

BBOWNING. 



XVII 



€^e Ctue Enlarging of life 




O the external eye there is no 
great difference in men. 
Some are tall, some are short, 
some are heavy, some are 
light, some are slow, some 
are quick of movement. We soon learn that 
the real size of men is not measured by their 
height or their weight, or the alertness or 
slowness of their movements. A physical 
giant may be a very little man in intellectual 
or in moral quality, and a man of very small 
stature may be great in the things which 
make real manhood. 

The actual measurement of life is not 
therefore determined by the weigher's scales 
or by the tailor's patterns, but by qualities of 
mind and heart. When we are exhorted to 
enlarge our life, it is not meant that we shall 
increase our stature or add pounds to our 

[237] 



Clje OBeautt of ttotty 1®$$ 

weight, but that we shall grow in the things 
that make character, that give power, that 
add influence. There is always room for 
such enlarging. The possibilities are sim- 
ply immeasurable. No man is ever so good 
that he cannot be better. No one has ever 
attained so worthy a character that he can- 
not be worthier. No one is ever so noble a 
friend but he can become nobler. Richard 
Watson Gilder puts this truth in a beautiful 
way in a little poem: 

Yesterday, when we were friends, 
We were scarcely friends at all; 
Now we have been friends so long, 
Now onr love has grown so strong. 

When to-morrow's eve shall fall 
We shall say, as night descends, 

Again shall say: Ah, yesterday 
Scarcely were we friends at all — 

Now we have been friends so long; 

Our love has grown so deep, so strong. 

The same is true of every noble quality. 
All life is immortal. Its reach is infinite. Yet 
few of us begin to make of our own per- 

[238] 



C^e Cnie enlarging of life 

sonal life what we might make of it. We do 
not live as we could live. We touch only 
the edges of possible attainment. The call 
of Christ to us ever is to enlarge our lives. 
He wants us to have not life merely, but 
abundant life. Yet many of us are satisfied 
if we have life at all, even the smallest meas- 
ure of it. We live only at a " poor dying 
rate," as the old hymn puts it. Our veins are 
scant of life. We are not living richly. Our 
cheeks are thin and sunken. We are spirit- 
ually anemic. 

Men are looking after their bodies now a 
good deal more than they did formerly. We 
are taught that we ought to be well, that we 
ought to bring our bodies up to their best. 
Athletics may be overdone in some of our 
colleges, where some young men seem to 
think they have no minds, no souls, have only 
bodies. But true education thinks of all 
parts of the life — body, mind, and spirit — 
and seeks to make full-rounded men. That is 
what Christ means when he calls for abun- 
dant life. It means enlargement in all phases 

[239] 



C^e Beaut? of <£bet? l®ay 

and departments of our being. We are not 
living up to our full duty if we are not tak- 
ing care of our bodies. We are always in 
danger of over-indulging our appetites. 
Plain living and high thinking belong to the 
true life. Men talk about the mystery of 
Providence when their health is poor or when 
they break down early. They wonder why 
it is. Perhaps it would be more fair to put 
the responsibility on their own neglect of 
the laws of life and health. 

The heart makes the life. This is true of 
the physical life, — its health and fulness de- 
pend on the working of the heart. It is true 
also of the spiritual life. " Thy heart . . . 
shall be enlarged," is the promise to those 
who are called to live the life of divine grace. 

A larger heart makes a larger man. Love 
is the final measure of life. There is just as 
much of life in a man as there is of love, for 
love is the essential thing. Not to love is not 
to live. Love is the perfect tense of live. St. 
Paul tells us that though we have the elo- 
quence of angels, the gift of prophecy, and 

[240] 



C^e Ctue Enlarging of iLtfe 

though we have all knowledge, and faith to 
work the most stupendous miracles, and the 
largest benevolence, and have even a martyr 
spirit, but have not love, we are nothing. We 
are empty. When we say that our heart is 
enlarged, we mean we are growing in love, 
becoming more kind, more long-suffering, less 
envious, less irritable, seeing more of the 
good in others and less of things to blame 
and condemn, having more patience, more 
gentleness, more sympathy. 

We must also make sure that what seems 
to us to be enlargement of life is really en- 
largement. " Getting is not always gain- 
ing." A man may be growing in certain ways 
and yet be really dwindling. He may bulk 
more largely before the eyes of men, and yet 
in the sight of heaven be a smaller man than 
when he seemed least. Writers distinguish 
between possessing and inheriting. In one of 
the Beatitudes we read, " Blessed are the 
meek: for they shall inherit the earth." 
The meek are the unresisting. They are not 
the strenuous among men. Ordinarily they 

[241 ] 



€^e TStauty of €totvy 3©a? 

do not grow rich. They do not add field to 
field. They are not generally regarded as 
successful. They are not shrewd, and are 
easily imposed upon. Ambitious and un- 
scrupulous men often take advantage of 
them. They do not contend for their rights. 
They give to him who asks of them, and 
from him that takes away their goods they 
demand them not again. 

It seems strange, therefore, to read of the 
meek that they shall inherit the earth. But 
note the word that is used, - — inherit. They 
do not possess the earth. They do not have 
its millions in their own name. A writer, 
speaking of the Beatitudes, says : " The men 
who leave behind them much hoarded wealth, 
rarely leave anything else. Their names are 
not known in religion, in education, in social 
reform. The scholars, the thinkers, the poets 
and saints, the men who raise the moral stat- 
ure of mankind, usually die poor." Yet the 
Master says of just such as these, that they 
shall inherit the earth. What does he mean? 
There is a world-wide difference between get- 

[242] 



W$z €rue (Enlarging of Life 

ting and gaining, between possessing and 
inheriting. A man may acquire power and 
may amass millions of money. That is, he 
may put his name on the millions. He may 
own railroads, banks, mines, houses, but his 
vast wealth really means nothing to him. At 
the heart of it all, there is only a poor, mis- 
erable, dwarfed soul. Then when he dies, 
he is a beggar, like the rich man in our 
Lord's parable, — owning nothing. He takes 
none of his money with him. He possessed 
millions, — he inherited nothing. He made 
nothing really his own. No part of his 
wealth was laid up in heaven. No part of it 
was ever wrought into his own life. No part 
of it was put into the lives of others. 

There is no true enlarging of the heart 
and life in such acquisition as this. A man 
may increase in money-possessions until the 
boy of poverty has become a millionaire, and 
yet be no wiser, no greater in himself, no 
more a man, with not one more worthy qual- 
ity of character. He may live in a great deal 
finer house, with richer furniture and rarer 

[243] 



C^e 'Beaut? of €tevy l®ay 

pictures and costlier carpets, but the man 
in the midst of all the splendor is no better, 
no greater. He may have a large library 
in the part of his house where the library 
ought to be, but the books have done nothing 
for him, have been nothing to him ; the pages 
are uncut ; he has not taken any of them into 
his life. He was told that a rich man ought 
to have a fine library and he bought one, but 
never read a book. 

He may have lovely gardens on his estate, 
with rare plants and flowers, but he knows 
nothing of any of them, and they mean noth- 
ing to him. They have put neither beauty 
nor fragrance into his life. He may have 
great works of art in his house, purchased 
for him by connoisseurs at fabulous prices, 
but he knows nothing of any of them. All 
the costly things he has gathered about him 
by means of his wealth are but vain bits of 
display. They mean nothing to the man. 
They represent no taste, no culture, no voca- 
tion of his. He is no greater, no more intel- 
ligent, no more refined, because of owning 

[244] 



C^e Ctue Cnlatgtng of life 

them. His life is no more beautiful, no more 
gentle or useful, for any or all of them. 

There is no true enlarging of life in all 
this. Acquisition is not gain, possessing is 
not inheriting. The way the meek man in- 
herits the earth is by getting the beautiful 
things of the world into his life, not merely 
by having them added to his estate. It is 
not by owning mountains, but by having the 
mountains in his heart that a man is really 
enriched. Dr. Robertson Nicoll, in speaking 
of owning and possessing, says : " I occa- 
sionally go out on a Saturday afternoon 
along a Surrey lane. Who owns that lane? 
I do not know. But I possess it. It belongs 
to me, for I can appreciate its beauty of 
color and contour; I go through it with a 
rejoicing heart, and I care not who holds 
the title-deeds." 

A man who is seeking to enlarge his life 
may continue poor all his years in an earthly 
sense, but he receives into his life qualities of 
character which make him a better and 
greater and richer man. St. Paul lost all his 

[ 245] 



C^e istmxty of Ciier? ?&a? 

■ * 

money, all his earthly inheritance, in follow- 
ing Christ. But think what a glorious 
Christian manhood he built up meanwhile for 
himself! Think of the way he blessed the 
world by his life, by his teaching, by his 
splendid self-sacrifice, by his influence! 
Think of all he gave to the world in his 
words ! He scattered seeds of truth, plants 
of beauty everywhere. Think how the world 
has been blessed and enriched by what he 
said and did. His heart was enriched and 
his life grew into marvellous ardor and in- 
fluence. Jesus said, " No man . . . hath left 
house, or brethren, or sisters, or mother, or 
father, or children, or lands, for my sake, 
and for the gospel's sake, but he shall receive 
a hundredfold now in this time, houses, and 
brethren . . . and lands." Whatever we 
part with in following Christ we shall get 
back again, in our own lives, in real posses- 
sion, in rich blessing. 

When we speak of the true enlarging of 
the life, we must think of such enlarging as 
this, — not of a man's property, but of him- 

[246] 



C^e Crue (Enlarging of life 

self. You have grown richer, perhaps, these 
years; you have a great bank account, a 
bigger and finer house, more property, are 
more widely known among your fellows, oc- 
cupy a more conspicuous place; but are you 
a larger man, are you truer? Have you 
more peace in your breast? Is your heart 
warmer? Do you love your fellow-men any 
more? Are you giving out your life more 
unselfishly to make others better? Are you 
making yourself more continually a bridge 
that others may cross over life's chasm; a 
stairway on which the weak, the weary, the 
struggling, the lowly, may climb up to better 
things? The enlarging life is one that is 
growing more Christlike every day, that has 
more of the fruits of the Spirit in it, — love, 
joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, self- 
control. 



[247] 



C^roug^ t^e gear <mity ct^oti 



" Whichever tcay the tcind doth blow 
Some heart is glad to have it so; 
Then blow it east or bloto it west, 
The wind that blows, that wind is best. 

" My little craft sails not alone; 
A thousand fleets from every zone 
Are out upon a thousand seas; 
And ivhat for me were favoring breeze 
Might dash another, with the shock 
Of doom, upon some hidden rock. 
And so I do not dare to pray 
For winds to waft me on my way, 
But leave it to a Higher Will 
To stay or speed me; trusting still 
That all is well, and sure that He 
Who launched my bark will sail with me 
Through storm and calm, and will not fail, 
Whatever breezes may prevail, 
To bring me, every peril past, 
Within his sheltering port at last J 9 



XVIII 




N ancient heathen religions 
there were deities for times 
and places. The gods were 
local. In passing through 
countries the traveller would 
find himself passing from under the juris- 
diction and protection of one deity to-day to 
the sway and shelter of another to-morrow. 
But where the one true God is known and 
worshipped we have no such perplexity in 
finding divine care. We do not have to 
change Gods as we pass from place to place. 
Our God is the God of the mountains and of 
the valleys, of the land and the sea, of the 
day and of the night. He is the God of all 
nations and wherever we journey, to the re- 
motest parts of the world, we are always in 
his kingdom. We never can get away from 
beneath the shadow of the wings of Jehovah. 

[251] 



C^e TBeaut? of cftiett %>w 

There is something wonderfully comforting 
in this truth of the universality of God and 
his care. 

Then God is also the God of all time. 
" Lord, thou hast been our dwelling-place in 
all generations. . . . Even from everlasting 
to everlasting, thou art God." Two friends 
set out, side by side, at the beginning of a 
year, hoping to walk together to the year's 
end, but they are not sure that they will. 
Their fellowship may continue, but many set 
out together who do not complete the year 
in company. One is taken and the other left. 
We are sure, however, that nothing can in- 
terrupt our walk with God. The great Com- 
panion cannot die. Though our earthly life 
ends, we still shall be with God. Nothing can 
separate us from him. 

This is a sweet thought for a new year, 
that we go through it with God. The sen- 
timent is devout and fitting. Whether we 
do it conscientiously and reverently, or with- 
out thought, unconsciously, we shall cer- 
tainly go through the year with God. We 

[252] 



cannot help it. We cannot get away from 
him. The atheist thought to teach his child 
his own negation of belief and wrote for her, 
" God is nowhere." But the child spelled out 
the words, and in her own simplicity made 
them read, " God is now here." We cannot 
get away from God any hour of the year, 
whatever we may do. It is better, however, 
that we go through the year consciously 
with God. Then we shall experience con- 
tinually the joy of his presence, the inspira- 
tion of his love, and the guidance of his 
hand. 

We write in our letters, Anno Domini, " In 
the year of our Lord." There is something 
very beautiful and suggestive in this. Our 
years are all really years of our Lord. We 
should make them so indeed, — years of 
Christ. This means that we should remem- 
ber they are his, — not the world's, not ours, 
but Christ's. Only he should be permitted to 
direct us ; all the work we do should be for 
him, and all our life we should live to get his 
approval. Thus we shall make the years, 

[253] 



C^e iszmty of €\>zxy &av 

in fact as they are in name, years of our 
Lord. 

We want to give our whole year to God, 
but we can do this only by giving him the 
days one by one as we begin them. An Eng- 
lish clergyman says that one of the most in- 
fluential memories he cherishes of his father 
is that every morning, as he went out from 
his home to his work, he would say solemnly 
in the presence of his family, " I go forth 
this day in the name of the Lord." God 
breaks up our life into days to make it easier 
for us. We could not carry at one load the 
burden of a whole year, — we would break 
under it, — so he gives us only a day at a 
time. Anybody ought to be able to get 
through a single day, whatever its duty, its 
care, or its suffering. The trouble too often 
is that we look at a whole year at one 
glimpse, and it dismays us to think that we 
have all its accumulated burdens to bear and 
tasks and duties to do. We forget that we 
have only one thing to do for any minute, 
and we can easily do that. 

[ 254 ] 



C^oufil) tyt $zat ttritij (Bon 

" One step and then another, 

And the longest walk is ended; 
One stitch, and then another, 

And the longest rent is mended; 
One brick upon another, 

And the highest wall is made; 
One flake upon another, 

And the deepest snow is laid. 

u Then do not look disheartened 

On the work you have to do, 
And say that such a mighty task 

You never can get through; 
But just endeavor, day by day, 

Another point to gain, 
And soon the mountain which you feared 

Will prove to be a plain." 

One of the secrets of a beautiful life is 
found in this simple rule, — living day by 
day. We can go through one little day with 
God, whatever its path may be. When we 
rise in the morning, we may give ourselves to 
him just for the day. We do not know what 
it will have for us, — joy or sorrow, ease or 
hardship, — but no matter ; what God gives 
or sends we must accept and do sweetly, 
faithfully, the very best we can. The day 
may have interruptions, and our own plans 

[255] 



C^e iBeaut^ of €toty %>ay 

may have to be set aside. But such inter- 
ruptions are only bits of God's will set into 
our schedule in place of our own thoughts of 
duty. If we are going through the day with 
God, we need never trouble about not getting 
all our self-imposed tasks finished, if only we 
have done God's will each hour. What we 
could not do was not ours to do, that day 
at least. What of our own planning was set 
aside by God's plan, we need not fret 
over, for God's allotment is better than 
ours. 

If we are going through the year with 
God, we need have no fear for the difficulties 
or the hindrances of the way. The path will 
be opened for us as we go on, though it be 
through mountains, and the seeming obsta- 
cles will not only disappear as we come up 
to them, but will prove to be stairways or 
stepping-stones to higher planes, gates to 
new blessings. As Peter followed the angel, 
his chains fell off, the doors and gates opened 
of their own accord, and he was led out of 
his prison into the free air and back to his 

[256] 



C^vougl) ti&e pear toit^ <0o& 

work. In every faithful and obedient Chris- 
tian life hindrances become helps. 

" Yet this one thing I learn to know, 
Each day more surely as I go, 
That doors are opened, ways are made, 
Burdens are lifted or are laid, 
By some great law unseen and still, 
Not as I will." 

Making the journey with God is assur- 
ance that every step is a real and true ad- 
vance. Some people come to birthdays re- 
gretfully. They do not like to confess that 
they are growing older. But there is no 
reason for regret, if only we are living our 
years as we should live them, as we may live 
them. Empty years are a dishonor. Years 
filled with sin are blots in the calendar. We 
should be ashamed to come to a birthday at 
the close of a year of idleness, indolence, 
neglect, or unfaithfulness. Jesus said we 
must give account for every idle word we 
speak. It will be an unhappy reckoning 
that we must make after an idle year or for 
idle hours and days in a year. 

[257] 



But there need never be a shadow of re- 
gret in coming to a birthday or to a new 
year when we have lived our best through all 
the days. If we go through a year with God, 
we shall come to its close with enlarged life, 
with fairer character, with richer personal- 
ity, in every way a better man or woman. 
Growth is a law of life. When growth 
ceases, death is beginning. Men count the 
age of trees by the circles which the years 
make. God counts our age, not by the date 
in the old family register, but by the accre- 
tions his eye sees in our inner life. If a 
man is put down as threescore and ten, and 
has lived only one year with God, he is really 
only one year old, not seventy. 

Growth, too, is not marked by height or 
weight or by accumulations of money or 
property or earthly honor, but by character. 
You may be more popular at the end of a 
year, people may know you better, you may 
be more in the newspapers, but these are not 
the real measurements of life. You may be a 
really smaller man at the heart of the noto- 

[258] 



riety you have achieved than you were with- 
out fame. Ruskin says, " He only is ad- 
vancing in life whose heart is getting softer, 
whose blood warmer, whose brain quicker, 
whose spirit is entering into living peace." 
The journey through the year with God 
should be joyous from beginning to end. 
A life of praise is the ideal life. No other 
is beautiful. Yet praise is by no means 
universal even among Christians. Somehow 
many people do not train themselves to see 
the glad things. There are a thousand 
times more things to make us glad than to 
make us sad. A writer tells of cycling in 
England with a friend. They were flying 
down a hill, through a woods. The friend 
stopped and jumped off his wheel, and they 
both stood and listened. From the woods on 
either side came songs of nightingales, — 
one, two, three, four, five, six. It is marvel- 
lous how much music God can put into a lit- 
tle bird's throat. The forest seemed filled 
with song. The loneliest places in life are 
thus filled with music if we have ears to hear 

[259] 



€tye I3eaut? of Cfcen? %>ay 

what the myriad voices say. The trouble 
with too many people is that their ears mis- 
interpret the sounds that fall upon them. 
They hear only sadness, while they ought to 
hear songs. If we would learn to find even 
the thousandth part of the good there is in 
the world, we would sing all the way. Thus 
we would have all our life transfigured. One 
of the Sunday afternoon songs the British 
Weekly gives its readers teaches somewhat 
severely, yet in unforgettable fashion, a good 
lesson: 



If you wish to grumble, go 

Where there's no one nigh to hear; 
Let the story of your woe 

Fall upon no mortal ear. 

Store your troubles far away, 
Hid within some jungle deep, 

Where nobody 's like to stray, 

Or to hear you when you weep. 

But if joy hath come to you, 

Shout it, spread it far and wide; 

Share with others all the true 
Happinesses that betide. 

[260] 



Ctyrougty ttye ^eat ttritty d5oU 

Joy and pain contagious are. 

Smiles evoke their kith and kin. 
Tears will travel fast and far 

If you fail to hold them in. 

Who is blest the better? He 

Who hath filled the world with cheer, 

Or the man of misery 
With his ever-ready tear? 

To go through the year with God is the 
noblest, divinest, blessedest thing any one can 
do. It will lead the feet on an upward path 
every step of the way. Though the outward 
life waste, the inward life shall be renewed 
day by day. 



[261] 



€^e ffiemembettf 



" The day was dull and drenched and cold, 
Full half a year from June — 
Was this the garden where, of old, 
The birds sang late and soonf 

" Gray mists, more desolate than rain, 
Hung low o'er borders bare; 
Would ever roses bloom again, 
Or sunbeams linger there? 

" But, sudden, from a laurel spray, 
There came a gift of cheer — 
A robin's joyous roundelay, 
Full, sorrowless, and clear: 

" ( His will be done! God's will is love,' 

He sang, ' and love is rest; 
Through mist below or cloud above 
His ways are always best' " 



XIX 




NE of the secrets of a happy 
life is the memory of past 
favor and good. Some 
people forget the pleasures 
and kindnesses that made 
yesterday glad, and to-day, when there are 
only unpleasant things, are overwhelmed and 
cannot find one thing to make them happy. 
But if we remember how bright last night's 
stars were, to-night, when not a star can be 
seen, ought not to dismay us. Mr. Charles 
G. Trumbull tells a beautiful little story 
which illustrates this. It is an incident of 
an Austrian watering place: 

" t Ah ! but I have the remembers,' said 
the young Austrian doctor, with a happy 
smile. The day was gloomy and dismal, for 
it was raining hard. The great Kaiserbad, 
with its white steps and handsome architec- 
ture, that shone so gleamingly beautiful under 

[265] 



C^e Beaut? of cEto? ?Da? 

a noonday sun, now looked a dirty yellow as 
the rain beat upon its sides, and trickled down 
the ins and outs of its masonry. Few people 
were to be seen on the streets or in the music- 
gardens and open-air cafes of the usually 
lively little Bohemian resort. Even the peaks 
of the surrounding Austrian Alps could be 
seen but dimly through the clouds and fog. If 
one was ever to be depressed by the weather, 
it seemed as though the time had come. 

" So thought an American visitor, who, on 
ascending the steps of the Kaiserbad for his 
customary Swedish gymnastics and bath, had 
met one of the little physicians in attendance. 
But only yesterday the Prince of Bulgaria 
had completed his stay in the village. He had 
conferred an honorable order upon the chief 
physician at the Kaiserbad, and had given 
each of the lesser lights a princely fee as a 
parting token. No wonder that the spirits 
of the young doctor were not to be dampened 
by a mere rainy day. So, in response to the 
American's ' Good-morning : what disagree- 
able weather ! ' came quickly in broken Eng- 

[266] 



C^e isememberg 



lish, ' Ah ! but I have the remembers.' The 
words and the lesson stayed with those to 
whom they were afterward repeated, and the 
thought of the gloom-banishing power of the 
little doctor's 6 remembers ' had been more 
effective and far-reaching than perhaps he 
or the Prince of Bulgaria ever dreamed of." 
If we all would keep in our hearts the 
" remembers," the memory of the beautiful 
things, the cheering things, the happy things 
that come to us in our bright, pleasant days, 
we should never have a day of unrelieved 
gloom. The weather is the cause of a great 
deal of unhappiness. A cloudy or rainy day 
makes a great many people wretched. You 
go out on a dripping morning in a mood like 
the weather, and nearly everybody you meet 
will greet you with a complaint about the mis- 
erable day. The Kaiserbad tourists were not 
sinners above all people, though, possibly, 
being invalids to some degree, they were 
more excusable than most others who 
grumble about lowering skies and dripping 
mists. The trouble with many people is that 

[267] 



Clje "Beauty of Cfcet? 2£>a? 

the gloom of the weather gets into their 
hearts and darkens their eyes and makes 
them unhappy. Ofttimes whole days are 
altogether spoiled for them in this way. 

The Kaiserbad doctor's philosophy ought 
to come in with fine effect on every such day. 
" Ah, but I have the remembers." To-day 
may be gloomy, but remember what bright 
sunshine you had yesterday. There are few 
people who do not have many such remem- 
bers in the story of their lives, if only they 
would recall them in the days when they are 
discouraged; and if only they would recall 
them, their gloom would be lightened. 

The Bible is full of exhortations to remem- 
ber : " Thou shalt remember all the way 
which Jehovah thy God hath led thee these 
forty years in the wilderness." " Remember 
the day when thou earnest forth out of the 
land of Egypt all the days of thy life." 
" But I will remember the years of the right 
hand of the Most High." The memory of 
past goodness should shine in the present 
darkness, however deep and dense it is. 

[268] 



C^e Eememberg 



Once you were in great perplexity. You 
seemed hopelessly shut in. You could see 
nothing but danger and loss. Then in a mar- 
vellous way God led you out into a large 
place. In your present gloom and fear, 
whatever it is, remember this former deliver- 
ance. Yesterday's mercy ought to be a 
guarantee for mercy to-day. Yesterday's 
kindness should keep our hearts warm in 
spite of to-day's hardness. " I will remember 
the years of the right hand of the Most 
High." Those were glorious years. They 
were full of sunshine. They were full of love. 
There were no troubles then. Everything 
was bright. The air was full of bird songs. 
The paths were strewn with flowers. All was 
prosperous. Now all is changed. The birds 
are not singing to-day. The flowers have 
faded. The friends are gone. Prosperity 
has given way to adversity. 

But have you forgotten the past? Ought 
not the memory of the goodness of other 
blessed days to shine through the clouds of 
to-day and to touch them with glory? "I 

[ 269 ] 



C&e 'Beaut? of €\*tty &ay 

will remember the beautiful years that are 
gone, and remembering them will bring them 
back again, 



55 



" Thank God for friends your life has known, 

For every dear departed day; 
The blessed past is safe alone — 

God gives, but does not take away; 
He only safely keeps above 
For us the treasures that we love." 



Why are we so fickle in our faith and glad- 
ness? We are on the mountain top one hour 
and next hour we are away down in the dim 
valley. We have all the great and essential 
elements of happiness on a dark, rainy day 
that we had on the bright day a week ago. 
We have God, we have hope, we have love. 
Why should we let a little drizzle, a gust of 
wind, and a flurry of sleet darken our mood 
and make all things seem hopeless for us? 
Why should one dreary day make us forget 
whole weeks of bright sunshine and fragrant 
air? Ought not the ' remembers 5 to save us 
from such gloomy feelings? 

[270] 



€^e ISememberg 



We ought to keep always the lesson of the 
" Remembers," as the Kaiserbad doctor 
taught it. Yesterday had been a glorious 
day for him because the king had put a deco- 
ration upon him. The honor had so im- 
pressed him, so filled his heart with gladness, 
that no unpleasant weather could make him 
forget it. What did a little rain amount to 
while he wore the decoration and remembered 
the great favor the king had bestowed upon 
him? "A miserable day," other people said 
to the doctor when they met him. " Oh, no ; 
I have the remembers ! " 

If to-day is gloomy and cheerless, remem- 
ber the past days that were glorious in their 
brightness. Let their splendor strike 
through to-day's clouds. In the old Psalm 
we read, " This is the day which Jehovah 
hath made." This is true of every day, — 
not only of the rare days of June, so marvel- 
lous in their splendor, but just as really of 
the sombre days of November and the wintry 
days of January. The aspect of the dreary 

[271] 



C^e 'Beaut? of €Uty ^a? 

days is only a thin veil, behind which always 

are blue heavens, glorious sunshine. God 

made the days, and he made every one of 

them beautiful. If to-day is dark and misty, 

it has divine beauty in it nevertheless. If 

things seem adverse, God is still God, our 

Father, still love, and nothing is really going 

wrong. 

God's in his heaven — 
All 's right with the world. 

Even Luther, heroic as he was in his faith, 
sometimes lost confidence in the long and 
hard struggle of the Reformation. Once it 
is said he seemed to have given up utterly, 
and was almost in despair. No one could 
revive his hope. In the morning his wife 
came down to breakfast in deep mourning. 
Luther noticed her garb and in alarm asked, 
" What is wrong? Who is dead? " " Why, 
don't you know? Didn't you hear it? God 
is dead." Luther rebuked her for her words 
in saying that God was dead. God could not 
die. Then she told him that God must be 

[272] 



€^e Bemembettf 



dead or he would not have become so hope- 
less. Her reply brought back to the great 
reformer the old trust. 

We sometimes need to be reminded that 
God is not dead. He lives, he always lives; 
he loves, he always loves. The fluctuations 
in our experience are not fluctuations in the 
divine interest and care. " I, Jehovah, 
change not," is an Old Testament assur- 
ance. Then in the New Testament we have 
it thus : " Jesus Christ is the same yesterday 
and to-day, yea and for ever." This faith 
in the unchanging God should bridge over all 
the chasms of earthly trial and keep ever in 
our hearts a joyous trust. 

There are many people who find their 
trouble not in the actual experiences of to- 
day, which may be kindly, but in dreading to- 
morrow, which may bring gloom or disaster. 
All is well now, but they see a dark stream 
just before them, and they fear its floods. 
But the memories of the past in which good- 
ness has never failed should teach us never to 
be anxious about any to-morrow, 

[273] 



C^e 'Beaut? of €tety 3®ay 

" There 's a stream of trouble across my path. 

It is black and deep and wide. 
Bitter the hour the future hath 

When I cross its swelling tide. 
But I smile and sing and say: 
* I will hope and trust alway ; 

I '11 bear the sorrow that comes to-morrow, 
But I '11 borrow none to-day.' 

"To-morrow's bridge is a crazy thing; 

I dare not cross it now. 
I can see its timbers sway and swing, 

And its arches reel and bow. 
O heart, you must hope alway; 
You must sing and trust and say: 

6 1 '11 bear the sorrow that comes to-morrow, 
But I Tl borrow none to-day.' " 

Count your blessings. Do not forget the 
multitude of your benefits in the recollection 
of the few disappointments and discomforts 
you have had. Let the many joyous re- 
members blot out the marks of the lines that 
stand black in the record. Even your sor- 
rows are seed-plots of blessing. When you 
get to heaven and look back, you will see that 
the days which now appear draped in mourn- 
ing have been your best days, — the fullest 
of good. Where the plough has cut deepest, 

[ 274 ] 



C^e Eememberg 



tearing up your garden of happiness and de- 
stroying the flowers of gladness, you will find 
loveliness a thousand times more wonderful. 
God never destroys, — he only and always 
fulfils. Out of sadness he brings light. Out 
of pain he brings health. Out of disappoint- 
ments he brings appointments of good. 
Every year is a harvest growing out of past 
3'ears, each one better than the one left 
behind. 

" Why do we worry about the nest ? 
We only stay for a day, 
Or a month, or a year, at the Lord's behest, 
In this habitat of clay. 

" Why do we worry about the road, 
With its hill or deep ravine? 
In a dismal path or a heavy load, 
We are helped by hands unseen." 

One was speaking of a friendship that was 
wondrously sweet, but lamented that it was 
given only for a short while. A year after 
marriage the loved one was gone. " I could 
almost have wished I had not had the friend- 
ship at all, — it was so soon ended," grieved 

[275] 



C^e I3caut? of €\>tvy i®ay 

the lonely one. Say it not. It is blessed to 
love and be loved, though it be only for a 
day. One of Richard Watson Gilder's sweet- 
est poems runs : 

Because the rose must fade, 
Shall I not love the rose? 

Because the summer shade 
Passes when winter blows, 

Shall I not rest me there 
In the cool air? 

Because the sunset sky- 
Makes music in my soul 

Only to fail and die, 

Shall I not take the whole 

Of beauty that it gives 
While yet it lives? 

It is sweet to have had your friend if only 
for a few days, for then you will have the 
memory forever, and this remember will cast 
its soft radiance down over all the years to 
come. 

A good woman wrote that she had found 
the secret of getting joy out of every sorrow. 
When the grief comes and begins to seem 
more than she can bear, she goes out and 

[276] 



C^e Bemembettf 



finds some other one in suffering or need, and 
begins to minister, to comfort. Then her 
own grief or trouble is gone. Try it. It will 
prove true for you too. Put your pain or 
sorrow into some service of love and it will be 
changed into a song. 



[277] 



Cattng for ttje TStt&tn C^tngjs 



"J will go and work for my King" I cried, 

" There are so many ways on every side." 

But my feet could not reach the open door, 

And I heard a voice whisper, " Try no more, 

Rest quietly on this bed of pain, 

Strength for some other day to gain." 

And my heart teas filled with dark despair, 

For how could I serve my Master there? 

While I lay idle day by day 

Those chances to work would slip away. 

Then slowly the darkness lifted, and lot 

Again came the whisper, soft and low, 

" When they cease to murmur against their fate, 

They also serve who only wait" 



XX 



Caring for t^e l3ro6en C&tttgg 




T was after the feeding of the 
five thousand. There was 
much bread left over, and 
Jesus bade the disciples 
gather up the broken pieces, 
that nothing be lost. The incident suggests 
our Lord's care for the fragments. Our 
lives are full of broken things. Indeed many 
people seem to leave nothing after them but 
broken pieces. They begin many things, but 
finish nothing. Life is too short for us to 
do more than begin things. It is said even of 
Jesus in his earthly life, that he only began 
to do and to teach. 

Think of the broken things in our lives, — 
the broken threads of our dreams, the broken 
hopes that once were brilliant as they shone 
before us, but now lie shattered about our 
feet; the broken plans we once made and ex- 
pected to see fulfilled, but which have not been 

[281] 



C^e QBeaut? of €Uxy l®ay 

realized. Most older people can recall lost 
dreams, hopes, and plans, cherished in the 
earlier years of their lives, but which seem to 
have come to nothing. Some of the men with 
whitening hairs supposed once they were 
going to be millionaires. But somehow the 
dream did not come true. Many of us think 
of our career as strewn with broken things 
like these, and say that we have made a fail- 
ure of our lives. Perhaps so, and perhaps 
not. It all depends upon what we have 
made of our life instead of what we once 
thought we would make of it; of what the 
broken things are that lie about us, and 
what the shining splendor really was which 
we have not attained. Carlyle describes 
success as Cfc growing up to our full spiritual 
stature under God's sky." If that is what 
we have been doing instead of becoming mil- 
lionaires, as we once dreamed we would, we 
have nothing to vex ourselves over. 

There is supposed to be a good deal of 
tragedy in the broken things of life, but there 
is a great deal more and sadder tragedy in 

[282] 



eating for t^e TBtofeen Clings 

very much of what the world calls success. 
Some one wrote under the name of a man who 
had achieved phenomenal success in business, 
this description, " Born a man and died a 
grocer." He became a great grocer, but the 
man was lost in the process. He was only a 
grocer now. It might have been better if his 
dream had been broken, — it certainly would 
have been better if the grocer had been a 
failure and through the failure the man had 
reached up to splendid spiritual stature 
under God's sky. 

Some people have lying about them broken 
dreams of social success. Some tell of dis- 
appointments in other ways, in scholarship, 
in art, in music, in friendship, in love, in hap- 
piness, in intellectual development, in popu- 
larity. Whatever these shattered dreams 
may be, Christ bids us gather up the broken 
pieces. They are of priceless value or the 
Son of God would not set his eye upon them 
and so earnestly call us to gather them all 
up. There is ofttimes far more value in the 
broken things of life, things men weep over, 

[283] 



C^e OBeautt of ttozty %>ay 

things they regard as only the wreckage of 
failure, than there is in the things they pride 
themselves upon as the shining token of their 
greatness. God's thoughts are higher than 
our thoughts and his ways than our ways. 
When he touched your brilliant dream and it 
seemed to fall to nothing, he built something 
better for you instead. When your plan was 
shattered, he substituted his own far nobler 
plan in its place. 

It is said that when a cathedral was 
building an apprentice gathered thousands 
of broken pieces of stained glass, chippings 
from the glass used by the artists in making 
the great windows, and with these made a 
window of his own which was the finest in 
all the cathedral. Christ can take the 
broken things in our lives, our broken plans, 
hopes, joys, and dreams, and make perfect 
beauty, perfect truth, perfect love for us. 
You are discouraged by the losses you have 
had in business, the flying away on wings 
of the riches you were toiling for and trying 
to gather, but, as God sees, you have been 

[284] 



Catfng for tyz QBrofeett C^fttgg 

piling away in your soul riches of spiritual 
character while losing earthly possessions. 
You think of your sorrows and count your 
losses in them, but some day you will find 
that you are richer rather than poorer 
through them. What seems loss to you is 
gain. 

" That nothing be lost." This word ought 
to encourage us in all our life, in our Chris- 
tian work, and in our efforts to gather up the 
broken pieces that nothing be lost. We 
would say that when such a wonderful mir- 
acle had just been wrought, there was no 
need for pinching economy in saving the 
broken bits. Why should the disciples be 
required, each one of them, to carry a great 
basket of broken bread, to feed his hunger 
for days to come, when the Master could, by 
a word, make bread for him anywhere? 

For one thing, we know that God, with all 
his mighty power, never works the smallest 
unnecessary miracle. He will never do for 
you what you can do for yourself. 

For another thing, the Master wanted to 
[285] 



€^e iseaiit? of €fcer? 3^a-p 

teach his disciples, and he wants to teach us, 
to be economical. Waste is sin. To have 
gone off that day, leaving those good pieces 
of broken bread lying on the ground, bread 
of miracle, too, would have been a sin. One 
of the stories told of Carlyle is that one day 
when the old man was crossing a street he 
stopped half-way over, amid hurrying traffic, 
stooped down and picked up something lying 
there, brushed off the dust, then carried it to 
the curb-stone and laid it down gently as if 
it had been something of rare value. It was 
only a crust of bread, but he said in a voice 
of unusual tenderness, for him, " My mother 
taught me never to waste a particle of 
bread, most precious of all things. This 
crust may feed a little sparrow or a hungry 
dog." 

But bread is not the only thing that men 
waste. Time is valuable, — do we never 
waste time? Every hour is a pearl. Sup- 
pose you saw a man standing by the sea, 
with a string of pearls in his hands, and 
every now and then taking off one of them 

[286] 



Caring for tlje TBrofeen Cljiug* 

and flinging it into the waves. You would 
say he was insane. Yet how many hours of 
time, God's priceless hours, of your last 
week did you throw away into the sea? Life 
itself is wasted by many people. Judas said 
Mary had wasted her ointment in pouring 
it on the Master. A little later, however, 
Jesus spoke of Judas as the " son of perdi- 
tion," that is, son of waste. Judas wasted 
his life. He was made to be an apostle, and 
he died a traitor. 

Jesus was most solicitous for broken lives, 
always trying to save them. Nobody else 
ever had seen any preciousness in the world's 
broken lives before. Nobody had cared for 
the poor, the blind, the lame, and the palsied, 
until he came. The lunatic was bound with 
chains and turned out to wander wild where 
he would. The fallen were despised. Jesus 
was the first to care for these broken bits 
of humanity. He saw the gold of heaven 
gleaming in the debris of sin. He saw the 
possibilities of restored beauty and blessed- 
ness in the outcasts of society. " Gather up 

[287] 



C^e Beaut? of nftjer? l®ay 

the broken pieces," was his word to the dis- 
ciples, " that nothing be lost." That is his 
word to the church to-day. There is not a 
wreck of humanity anywhere, along life's 
rocks and shoals, that it is not the will of 
Christ that we should try to gather up and 
save. 

Those who are laboring to gather up the 
broken pieces should never be discouraged. 
Christ is with them wherever they go. They 
are his, these broken lives. No particle of 
matter ever perishes. Life is immortal and 
imperishable. No soul shall ever cease to be. 
Then no work for God is ever lost. 



" There is no labor lost, 
Though it seem tossed 
Into the deepest sea. 
In dark and dreary nights, 
'Mid stormy flash of lights, 
It cometh back to thee, — 
Cometh not as it went, 
So strangely warped and bent, 
But straight as an arrow new. 
And though thou dost not know 
How right from wrong may grow, 
From false the true, — 

[ 288 ] 



Caring for t^e i3rofceu things 

Thou mayest confess ere long — 

Sorrow hath broke forth in song, 

That life comes out of death, 

The lily and rose's breath 

From beds where ugly stains 

Were washed below by earthly rains. 

Fear not to labor, then, 

Nor say, ' I threw my time away ! ' 

It is for God, not men, 

To count the cost and pay." 

The broken pieces of bread were part of 
our Lord's miracle, and therefore were sa- 
cred. The broken things in our lives, if we 
are living faithfully, are of Christ's break- 
ing. They are his way of giving us what 
we have longed and asked for, of letting us 
do the things we wanted to do. It will be 
well if we accept them as such. The disap- 
pointment we had was Christ's appointment. 
One tells of a broken day, nothing done that 
in the morning was put into the schedule for 
the day, but countless interruptions instead. 
— the coming of others with their needs, to 
be helped, until all the hours were gone. In 
the evening the day was deplored and grieved 
over as a lost one, but the answer of comfort 

[289] 



€^e OBeautt of €Uvy 2^at 

given was that these interruptions were bits 
of the divine will coming into the human pro- 
gramme. They seemed only broken bits, but 
they were the best of all the day's work. We 
may gather up these broken pieces in faith 
and love. Not one of them shall be lost. 

There are broken pieces, however, in our 
lives which are not part of God's plan for 
us, but failures to do our whole duty. At the 
end of a year there are in our records many 
broken things, — broken pledges, broken 
promises, broken intentions, lying among the 
debris. Have there been tasks not even 
touched? Have there been duties of kind- 
ness left undone day after day? "Gather 
up the broken pieces." But can we? Can 
we make up for past failures? Yes, in a 
sense. Because you have been carrying a 
miserable grudge in your heart against a 
neighbor, treating him coldly, selfishly, un- 
christianly, for eleven months and eighteen 
days, is no reason why you should continue 
to keep the grudge in your heart, the un- 
loving coldness in your treatment of him, the 

[290] 



Cating (ov ti&e istofeen C^wgg 

remaining thirteen days of the year. Be- 
cause we have been haughty and proud and 
self-conceited, spoiling all the year thus far, 
must we spoil the little that yet remains of 
it? We cannot undo, but the people we have 
harmed and neglected will forget and for- 
give a very unkind and even cruel past, if 
we come now with genuine kindness and flood 
all the bitter memories with love while we 
may. 

It is a beautiful arrangement that Christ- 
mas comes in among the last days of the 
year. Its warmth melts the ice. Everybody 
gives presents at Christmas time. Dr. Rob- 
ertson Nicoll, in a happy suggestion for 
Christmas, says that giving presents is not 
always the best way to help the joy. Most 
of us do not need presents, he says. But 
what will do our hearts far more good is to 
write a batch of kind, affectionate, and en- 
couraging letters. We can readily call to 
mind friends and acquaintances with whom 
life has passed roughly during the year. Let 
us write to them. Write to the friend far 

[291] 



C^e QBeautt of €iotty 1®ay 

away, who is fighting a hard battle, and tell 
him what you think of his constancy. Write 
to the sick friend who fancies herself of no 
use in the world and tell her that her life 
matters much to you. Hugh Price Hughes, 
Dr. Nicoll says, kept very few letters, but in 
searching through his desk one day his wife 
came upon one from a special friend which 
Mr. Hughes had not destroyed. He had 
been passing through a serious trial, and 
this friend had written him a letter of en- 
couragement and strong affection. This 
letter he had preserved. Then Dr. Nicoll 
says, " If I were to covet any honor of 
friendship, it would be this, — that some 
letters of mine might be found in the desks 
of my friends, when their life struggle is 
ended." 

There is no way in which we can half so 
successfully gather up the broken fragments 
that we find strewed along the stories of our 
friendships, our associations with neighbors 
and business companions, as by doing a 
great deal of thoughtful letter-writing from 

[292] 



Caring iov t^e 13ro6en Ctyngg 

time to time. Write to the person you think 
is not your friend, does not like you. Do 
not say a word about your past difference 
or quarrel; just tell him that you have been 
thinking about him and want to wish him 
happiness. Write to the man who did you 
a marked unkindness during the year. Do 
not remind him of what he did, and do not 
tell him you have forgiven him. Just tell 
him that you wish him all the joys of the 
blessed days. Write to the discouraged per- 
son, to the one who is suffering, to the shut- 
in. To have a warm, sincere, encouraging, 
and cheerful letter on almost any morning 
will mean more to thousands of people than 
any gift you could have sent them. 

" Gather up the broken pieces which re- 
main over." Do at the end of a year, as far 
as you can, the things you have been leaving 
undone through the year. Go and say in 
the right place the kind words you have not 
spoken, but ought to have spoken. Do the 
duty that for a good while you have been 
neglecting to do. Gather up the broken 

[293] 



r' 



€^t TStauty of tbtty &>ay 

things, whatever they may be, as far as you 
can possibly do it. Finish up the unfinished 
things. Do the things that have been left 
undone. 

Time is short, and when the end comes, no 
hustling or hurrying of ours will enable us 
to go back and do neglected things of past 
years. It is said in the legend that Father 
Ventura died before he had finished writing 
his life of St. Francis, and so heaven let him 
come back for three days to finish the work. 
Dr. Watkinson suggests that if men could 
come back and complete what they have left 
unfinished, it would be a strange lot of work- 
ers we would find among us. " There would 
be preachers coming back to preach their un- 
spoken sermons, and what sermons they 
would be! Sunday-school teachers would 
come back to repair scamped lessons, and 
rich saints would come back to complete 
their giving, and what church collections we 
should have ! " 

But we are not going to come back, any 
of us, to finish up the work we have neg- 

[294] 



Cattng for tt)e l3tofeen Clings 

lected along the way. " Night cometh, when 
no man can work." Whatever we do for 
God and for man, we must do now, as we 
go along the way. What we get into the 
year's story, we must put in in the three 
hundred and sixty-five days which make up 
the year. 



[295] 






1910 



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